Page 105 of The Smuggler’s Escape

The silence behind told her Jackson wasn’t moving anymore.

She dove low and glanced back. No movement. Nothing.

She turned, plunged up through the bushes and leapt onto the track in the direction from which she had come, heedless of noise or danger. “Hurry up! We’ll miss the boat!”

“Quiet, bitch!” Two gunshots split the night. A shape toppled from behind a lone pine tree onto the path.

“Mordieu! What have you done?” She dashed past Jackson, back up the track to the writhing figure by the pine.

The man rolled quickly upward, clutching his arm, rocking back with a curse.

“Lieutenant Hale!” Relief coursed through her. She dropped, weak-kneed, to the ground. “Are you badly hurt?”

“Winged.” Hale struggled again to rise. “Run,” he grunted. “Get away while you can.”

“I can’t leave you here. I’ll bind your wound.” Noelle yanked the canvas bag open and pulled out her spare chemise. With her knife, she ripped it into strips and draped them over her shoulder.

Jackson halted several yards away, waving his pistol. He had tied a mask over his face and disguised his voice in a falsetto. “Have you lost your mind? He’s a bloody revenuer!”

“I told you I don’t hold with murder.” She folded one strip into a pad.

Hale struggled off the ground and backed against the pine. “Get out of the way, mademoiselle. He’s coming for you with a knife.”

Noelle swiveled. Sure enough, Jackson came slowly forward, a dagger in his hand.

Noelle pulled out her pistol. “And I have a gun.”

Jackson cursed and backed away. Still in that silly falsetto, he said, “He’ll send you to the gallows, stupid girl.”

No, you’re the one sending me there. “He’ll bleed to death if I don’t bind his wound. It won’t take long.” To Hale, she said, “I must remove your coat.” Without taking her eyes or the gun off Jackson, she tugged on the opposite sleeve of Hale’s coat. The exciseman struggled out of the coat, wincing at every move, and slumped against the tree, clutching his injured arm.

Jackson prowled nearer again. “There must be others nearby. You’ll have us both arrested.”

“That’s a risk I must take. Go ahead of me if you wish. I’ll catch up.” With one hand, Noelle pressed the pad to Hale’s bicep; with the other she waved the pistol at Jackson, who still hovered far too close. “Get back, cochon, or I’ll shoot. If you insist on brandishing that knife, this will take much longer.”

Jackson muttered something crude and insulting about the female gender.

“Go stand in the middle of the track,” Noelle said. Jackson threw up his hands and shuffled away. In Hale’s ear, Noelle whispered, “Are you sufficiently conscious to hold the gun on him, so I can bind your wound?”

Hale laughed breathlessly and put out a hand for the pistol. “Of course.”

Jackson, watching this exchange, let out a string of oaths.

“It’s your own fault,” Noelle told him. “If you had helped instead of hindering me, I would have been finished by now.” She wound one strip rapidly around Hale’s arm, then wound the other and tied it.

“Thank you, Mademoiselle de Vallon,” Lieutenant Hale said, a thread of amusement in his voice. “I suggest you take the gun, retrieve your horse, and return to Boltwood Manor immediately. Lord Boltwood has everything.” He stopped for breath. “Under control.”

What did that mean? She didn’t have time to puzzle it out. She shook her head. “There’s too much at stake. Stay conscious now, or Jackson will return and finish you off.” She slung the canvas bag over her shoulder, beckoned to the groom, and strode hurriedly down the track, still clutching her knife. Jackson’s horse cropped low grass at the verge up ahead.

Jackson followed, but reluctantly, too slowly, staying just out of pistol range and measuring the limits of Hale’s endurance, she was sure. She flung the words back on the wind. “Forget him. Let’s go.” Just a little longer, just a little further . . .

She reached Jackson’s mount, cut the packet from under the saddlebag, whacked the horse on the rump, and ran.

~ ~ ~

A minute after Richard separated from Will, two shots rang out. Richard’s blood ran cold. Three long fields stretched between him and Noelle, between her safety and perhaps her death. He sent up a desperate prayer, sent his hunter over the hedgerow, and flew at a gallop toward the sea.

~ ~ ~