Page 3 of Joy to the Earl

Not even stopping to think, Rosalind began to run, thankful she’d changed into her sturdy leather outdoor boots. Over her shoulder she called to the footman to fetch Mr. Vale and a cart, but continued at pace down the graveled driveway of Nelson Manor, her late husband’s adored country seat. The driveway was barely a half mile long, but it still felt like it took hours to reach the stone pillars and wrought iron gates.

Hitching up her gown and tucking it into the sash around her waist, she carefully slid down into the ditch. The water only reached her knees but was icy cold, and she gasped, thankful at least she wore woolen stockings and suede gloves. Several feet away, the carriage rested on an ominous angle; the broken door hanging drunkenly on one hinge, its elaborate family crest gouged almost unrecognizable and the side window smashed. Two wheels were missing, probably in pieces on the road, and the end where the horse’s bridles usually fastened was gone completely.

“Hello!” called Rosalind, inching as close to the creaking, rocking mess of wood and metal as she dared. “Hello!”

No one answered, and swallowing hard, she bent to examine the carriage. A well-dressed man covered in blood lay sprawled across one seat, but when she gently picked up his wrist, there was no pulse, not even a faint flutter. Bile rose in her throat, but there was no saving him or the driver, who’d been mangled by the front of the carriage tearing away from the back.

Oh God.

“Rosalind! What do you see?” called May from the end of the driveway, her face bright pink from the exertion of running.

“I’ve found two men…a driver and a passenger. I think that’s it—”

A sound interrupted her, so odd at first she thought she’d imagined it. A groan? Was there someone else?

Hiking through the freezing muddy slush, Rosalind peered around the back of the carriage. Partially trapped under a piece of door and almost submerged in the ditch was another man with a large, bloodied head wound. But his eyelids were fluttering!

“Lady Nelson!” yelled Phillip Vale as he and Donald brought the cart to a sliding halt on the snow-dusted roadside. “What can we do?”

“Two men are d-dead,” she replied, “but I think a third is still alive. We must move quickly—he’s injured and in the water.”

“I have some rope,” said Phillip. “Can you loop it under his arms? Then we can try dragging him out.”

Nodding, Rosalind tugged at the piece of door. Fortunately it moved easily, not yet frozen or embedded in the mud. But it revealed the man was huge, broad-shouldered, and very, very tall. “He’s large. I’ll need some help pushing him up.”

There was a small splash, and Claire waded toward her. “I’ll help you push, Rosalind. Phillip and Sir Donald can pull. My word, he is a big lad, isn’t he?”

“Sir,” Rosalind said loudly, touching his face. “Can you hear me?”

The man’s eyelids fluttered again, but didn’t open fully. Yet deep grooves appeared on his forehead and around his mouth as he grimaced. She could only imagine how the cold and pain must feel as it burst through the numbing shock of the accident.

“Help me,” he gritted out. “Please, ma’am.”

Rosalind’s eyes widened at the broad Yorkshire accent. He was far from home. “You just hold tight, lovely,” she soothed, wry tenderness enveloping her for a man who remained well-mannered in an extreme situation. “We’ll have you out of here in a moment. Can you wriggle your arms and legs? Good, good. Now I’m just going to tie this rope under your arms so we can lift you out.”

“Yes, ma’am.”

Carefully, she eased him forward, thankful for her own five-foot-ten inch statuesque figure as she propped his head on her shoulder and looped the thick rope around his massive chest. All while fighting the urge to stop and hold him as his skin turned pale blue and white, and his body shook with violent shivers. “Not long now, lovely. Here we go. One, two, three…heave!”

It took four attempts to get the man out of the ditch due to his size, plus the extra weight of his sodden clothing, the thick mud, and the falling snow, but eventually they got him up onto the roadside and into the waiting cart. May chafed his hands, Claire draped a horse blanket over his legs, and Rosalind cradled his head in her lap as Phillip and Donald drove the cart at the briskest pace possible back to the manor.

Servants charged out the double doors at their yells, and soon the man lay in front of a roaring fire in the bedchamber adjacent to Rosalind’s own, while Donald, Phillip, and several footmen returned to the roadside, unwilling to leave the other two bodies in the ditch. Claire hastened to her own chamber to change her wet clothing, leaving Rosalind and May alone with the stranger.

“Poor dear,” said May anxiously, as she stoked the fire. “He is frozen solid. Although desperately lucky to escape with no broken limbs.”

“I can’t get him warm enough. He’s turning bluer,” said Rosalind, panic making her hands clumsy as she tried to tuck a heavy quilt around the man.

“No good. Won’t help if he is still wearing wet clothing. Cut it off him. I’d do it myself, but Donald will be back soon and expecting me to tend him.”

Sucking in a deep breath, Rosalind leapt up and snatched her husband’s ceremonial dagger from above the fireplace. Slowly, tentatively, she cut the man’s jacket and shirt away, revealing a heavily muscled chest and arms. Then she tackled his ruined boots and trousers, her eyes widening as the fabric tore to reveal strong thighs and a cock that, even flaccid, was long and very thick. “Do you think I should get some trousers…?”

“Better alive and unclothed than a modest corpse,” said May archly. “Perhaps you should warm him yourself; your cheeks are flushed enough.”

“Of course! Body heat.”

“Just as well you’re so tall, you’ll be able to cover most of him. The rest of us would be like frogs on a log…I must go see to your uncle. We’ll talk later.”

Rosalind bit her lip, unable to stop staring at the perfection of the naked man’s body. Giving herself a sharp mental slap, she quickly wrenched off her own damp, mud-splattered clothing, cutting away her stays and the laces to her boots before cuddling into his side, clad only in a thin, thigh-length chemise. As she wrapped her arms around him, his skin was so cold it made her hiss in discomfort, but she gritted her teeth and held on.