Page 21 of Love and the Shameless Lady

Chapter 4

The gun should have been in the drawer. Daisy remembered returning it after being shot at and hadn’t touched it, hadn’t taken it out since, which meant someone else had.

Someone who was now at her door? Someone who wanted to kill her. Heart thudding frantically, she got out of bed. The only weapon she now possessed was a penknife, of all useless things! She considered her options. If she waited, he would get the door open and kill her before she could get past. If she screamed? Her room was at the end of a long corridor, and beneath her was a storeroom. Ned and Sally slept on the ground floor at the back of the house. Mr. Bonaventure’s room was also too far away.

She might be heard, but equally likely might not. She glanced about. The subtle sounds continued ominously. She hurried to the chest of drawers, but it was far too heavy to push across the room to block the door. In a beam of moonlight, the door shifted slightly.

The window.

She dashed to the window, threw open the casement, hiked her nightdress up around her waist, took the penknife between her teeth, and climbed onto the sliver of thatch beneath the dormer. Clinging to the frame, she shut one side of the casement, edged along to the roof proper, and reached back to shut the other side of the casement.

Perhaps he wouldn’t realize where she’d gone.

Because she wasn’t exactly safe up here. If he tried to follow her out the window, she would stab whatever she could reach with the penknife and then push him off the roof. But he might well pull her down with him.

Whoever he was, he probably wasn’t that stupid—particularly since he must be a paid assassin, for she couldn’t imagine Lady Bilchester breaking into her room to murder her in person. What if he came outdoors and shot her? She was far too visible in her white nightdress, in the light of the nearly full moon.

She crawled slowly up the damp, slippery thatch to the crest of the roof and peered down the other side. All was silent and still. If she could get down onto the lean-to addition, her cries might reach Ned or Sally or the groom in the nearby stable.

On the other hand, she would be much easier to shoot from there.

“Miss Warren?” came a soft voice from below.

A few hours earlier, as Julian prepared for bed, he’d tried to formulate a plan. At the Diving Duck, the marquis hadn’t approached any of the smugglers. This didn’t mean much. Quite possibly, he obtained information from highly placed friends and acquaintances, whilst Antoine passed it to France by way of smugglers, under the guise of purchasing silks and laces.

Julian lay in bed, mulling things over, and concluded that his best course was to find out whom Bonaventure intended to visit this summer and wangle a few invitations for himself. Hopefully an easy matter, as he was generally well-liked. His modest, civilized air, which he’d acquired naturally in his tediously respectable family, suited him perfectly for the dubious occupation of spy. Who would ever dream that mild-tempered Julian Kerr dirtied his hands with such foul work?

Ah, well. If Bonaventure’s hosts had connections with government or the military, there might be cause for suspicion. He damned well hoped not.

He found after a while that he wasn’t sleepy and decided to go out for a walk.

It was a faultlessly beautiful night. The River Ribble flowed timelessly past. The moon’s reflection shimmered on the water, and the stars and planets gleamed above. He strolled in the direction of the Diving Duck, his thoughts turning automatically to the impossible Miss Warren. In his imagination, he ignored her scowl and her sharp tongue and pondered her breasts. Would her nipples be pink or brown, large or small? As for her legs . . . she had a well-turned ankle, but he would give something to get a glimpse of her calves. And thighs.

He raised his eyes and got his wish. Far more than a glimpse, and entirely for free.

What the devil was she doing on the roof?

She lay flat on her belly near the top, her nightdress rucked up almost to the apex of her thighs, looking down the other side. He enjoyed the view for a moment or two and then called her name.

She started, then raised her head and slewed around. “Oh, thank God.” Hastily, she tugged at her nightdress, which was too twisted to cooperate. He couldn’t suppress a smile.

“I need help!” she said grumpily.

“How did you get up there?”

“Out the window.” She glanced about and spoke just above a whisper. “Please, just help me get down. There’s a ladder behind the stable. I don’t think it’s long enough to use at the front, but it should reach the roof at the back.”

“All right, but why the devil are you up there?”

“I’ll tell you in a minute. Oh, please hurry! Someone might hear us.”

What, was she fretting about her non-existent reputation?

“Please! It’s not safe!”

That was genuine panic in her voice. With a regretful glance at her shapely legs, Julian went in search of the ladder.

Five minutes later, after stubbing his toes twice against invisible debris and almost falling over a rain barrel in the shadows, he found the ladder and brought it around. At first he couldn’t see her. She had come halfway down the roof and was crouched behind the kitchen chimney. He set the ladder against the wall and climbed up until his head and shoulders cleared the eaves.