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“Lord Hansbury, would you be so good as to walk me home?”

He stared at her offered hand. Glowered, more like, and then glanced at the lady’s maid. “God help me.” He gave Sophie his arm. “I need a smoke.”

twenty-nine

Meanwhile, in Hampshire

Shadows lapped at the edges of Rafe’s consciousness. They threatened to roll in again, all-consuming, but he blinked hard. Lucidity and deep breaths were blessings of the highest order. He knew that, now.

He hadn’t a clue how much time had passed. His recent memories were dim flashes: Spluttering on a bitter, walnut-shell-flavored liquid that had been poured down his throat. Coarse fingers slapping his right cheek. Choking, as those same hands came around his throat—first to squeeze, then to pound his head into the ground below. And the hollering …

“Feel like talkin’ now?”

“Where is she, you fool?”

“Damned idiot.”

No. He must stay awake.

He forced his eyes to focus. A cobwebbed ceiling. Old wooden trusses, done in the fashion of country cottages. He attempted to wet his lips; he may as well have run a rasp against pumice. His legs shook with violent tremors, and something under his left ribs pulsed, sending lightning bolts of pain to his middle.

He tilted his chin down. Ceiling met walls of dirty plaster. Rusted iron bedposts. A pair of bare feet, wretchedly white, and blue about the nails. Oh. They were his feet. And his legs must be somewhere beneath—

He grunted with the effort of trying to move them. Nothing budged an inch, save one of the leather straps that bound him to this ramshackle bed frame. Even that device only popped vaguely, as if to mock him. He wasn’t buried, and he wasn’t paralyzed—both possibilities had occurred to him in his delirious dream state. It was exceedingly, horribly plain: he was someone’s captive, cinched down as tightly as one of Mrs. Langworthy’s wards.

“The tea,” he rasped. Only the barest tuh actually sounded from his throat.

Summon the fellow at once. See that both of them are removed from this place. Those were the last words of hers he could remember. This was not strictly her doing then, and this dark den of captivity was probably not Locks Heath Asylum.

“Are you up, lad?”

Rafe turned his head toward the voice. Chenoweth sat in a small chair against the opposite wall. His white beard had never looked wilder, his middle never so pronounced, for his arms were wrenched behind him at an awkward angle, no doubt bound by the same leather ties as his ankles.

“Don’t try an’ speak, son.” The older man’s voice was labored, hushed. “’Tis all right.”

“Where?” The single syllable cost him dearly. He had many other fundamental questions, too, like: How long have we been here? How long can a man live without water? Who—?

No. The who, he was afraid he already knew.

“Save yourn strength.” Chenoweth tried to inch nearer in his chair, but he was almost as immobilized as Rafe. “Perhaps—”

“Well, well.” A healthy voice introduced into such a sickroom bore the strength of a military tattoo. Recognition struck Rafe instantly. It belonged to his father’s butler. Russ’s bald pate came into view, and then his glacial eyes and snarling mouth. “Did you have a good sleep?”

How very like Thomas Balfour to send someone in his stead. Rafe stared. Any attempt to speak would be an embarrassing reveal of how weak his body was.

The butler held a riding crop in one hand. He tossed it up, caught it, and spun it. As the blunt end neared Rafe’s side, he vowed not to make a move. Not so much as a squirm. The bastard wanted a show, but he would not—

The blunt handle of the crop drove into his ribcage. His teeth ground together. Pain reverberated from that place and beyond, like so many shockwaves.

“Don’t even remember my boot catching you there, do you?” Russ gave a dry laugh and rescinded the pressure. Rafe drew violent breaths.

“Tell me,” Russ said, crouching down until his eyes were level with Rafe’s. “Who is Sophie?”

Iron clattered against wood. A seam popped somewhere in the heavy cloth construction of Rafe’s straitjacket. Yes, he was in a bloody straitjacket. Just now, it probably appeared a reasonable decision on his captor’s part.

The burst of energy burned out quickly. His taut muscles fell limp, leaving him even weaker than before, and the butler grinned to show protruding yellow teeth. Damn me. Damn me to hell. He should have borne the question as he’d borne the crop.

“Perhaps we’ve run across a topic worthy of discussion, eh?” The man stood and spread his arms wide, making a great, noisy show of his stretch. “I gave you enough laudanum to dose a draft horse. Thought for certain you’d talk. And I’d have kept tryin’ it that a’way, too, had you not retched up my last three attempts. Tincture’s expensive. Your father mightn’t think well of my wasting it.”