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The man groaned. “Nothing is ever simple with you, is it?”
“Marcus?”
“Of course,” Marcus said softly. “I’ve come to save you, my lady. Whether you like it or not.”
She shook her head vehemently. “No, Marcus, no! You don’t understand! I will be ruined!”
“Exactly,” he said. “You need to be ruined. It’s the best thing for you.”
“You must not!” she cried, her voice rising. “My mother. They will harm my mother.”
There was a moment when no one spoke. She could hear her own breathing, harsh and strained. And then he said, “Your mother? Why should they harm your mother?”
It was Hettie who answered.
“Mr. Arnold has threatened to put my lady’s mother into a…a place where they’ll lock her up.”
“Yes,” Portia whispered, “it’s true.”
“So you’re telling me I can’t kidnap you because it would mean your mother will be punished?” Incredibly, he laughed.
“They’re using her as a sort of hostage to my good behavior,” Portia said. “I’ve been trying to think of some way to get her out of Grosvenor Square, They watch us all the time. Tonight is the first time Arnold isn’t accompanying me, so we planned to make the most of it.”
“You could have asked me to save her,” Marcus said mildly. “I’d have done it.”
“Would you?” She tried to see his eyes but it was too dark. “Never mind, we have made our own arrangements.”
He reached out and opened the coach door. “Come on, we have to hurry. I have another coach waiting on the other side of the gardens.”
“No, I told you, I can’t. My mother is waiting. We are going to pick her up in the mews and my coachman is taking her on to Cambridge.”
“Cambridge? Why Cambridge?”
“My great-aunt lives there.”
“They’ll know that, won’t they? They’ll have her back within hours. No, I’ll rescue your mother. I’m much better at it than you. But you must come with me.”
“I’m going to a ball at St. James’s,” she wailed.
“And very beautiful you look, too.”
Portia shot him a desperate look as he reached for her arm, assisting her down to the ground in her voluminous skirts. This close she could feel his warmth, smell his masculine scent, and as usual it was having its effect on her. Despite the situation she found herself in, she was glad to see him. Not because he said he would rescue her mother, but because he was Marcus.
“You promise you will help me if I come with you? This isn’t a trick?”
“I promise.” His eyes slanted wickedly as he smiled beneath his disguise.
“You’re as bad as Arnold,” she murmured.
“I’d be insulted, if I believed you meant it,” he said mildly. “He’s the villain and I am the hero. There is a vast difference. Do you promise?”
Did she have a choice? She did. But the need to say yes was overwhelming. “Oh…very well! But what of my own coach? They can’t go back yet, Arnold will know.”
“I’ll send them to the ball anyway, in case someone notices. If the coach is there, it will appear that you must be, too.”
Portia marched toward the dark bulk of his coach, her lavender skirts belling around her, her too-tight slippers pinching.
Suddenly, Hettie’s steps came pattering behind them and she tugged at Marcus’s cloak. “Take me!” she pleaded.
