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“See anyone?” he asked, already knowing the answer to his question.
“No.”
Who were the men in the public room? They’d looked like normal enough chaps to him, although he hadn’t really paid them much attention after deciding they were harmless. Yet Miss Fernley had wanted to be away from them—withhim—as quickly as possible.
“So, Miss Fernley, it seems a bit of a paradox that you would rather run headlong toward a stranger than greet someone you know. Who is he? What is his name and his connection to you?”And why were you so shaken by it?he wanted to add.
She dropped the curtain. “I don’t know his name. I know him only as someone who is frequently in company with . . . a person of my acquaintance.”
“Does this person have a name?”
“I’d rather not say,” she said.
“You must do better than that, Miss Fernley. You just proclaimed me to be your husband in front of a crowd of strangers in a busy inn. At midnight, no less.”
“I am truly in your debt, Mr. Jennings.”
“That remains to be seen, Miss Fernley. Leaving the question of this acquaintance of yours aside for the moment, I would ask you: Why me? Of all the people in the room, why did you run to me?”
“I don’t know,” she said. “I noticed you when I entered the inn, sitting by yourself, and you looked trustworthy. And I had to act quickly.”
“Trustworthy,” he mused aloud. “You could see my halo glowing where my hat should have been.”
“You mock me, but yes,” she eventually answered. “You were the safest alternative at the time.” She parted the curtain and began looking out the window again.
Hmm.
Lucas hadn’t been described as safe by anyone for several years now. He was tall, and rather than having a lean build like many tall men, he was muscular and proportioned to his height. He’d used his size to intimidate a lot of people, mostly enlisted men from the lowest dregs of humanity, who’d bullied those who were weaker than they.
He decided to use his size to intimidate this woman now, test her assumption that he was indeed safe. He needed to find out what her story was and if she was genuinely in need of assistance or was trying to trick him in some way. He crossed the room until he stood next to her, nearly touching.
She merely turned her head slightly in his direction, aware he was making a strategic action but calling his bluff and otherwise making no attempt to move, which surprised him.
“Miss Fernley,” he said to her ugly lace cap since that was all he could see of her at this proximity. “You must give me more of an explanation than the fact that you are avoiding the unnamed acquaintances of an unnamed acquaintance if I am to assist you further. I have no desire to be embroiled in your troubles.”
Her stomach growled in reply.
He sighed heavily. “And, of course, you’re also hungry.”
“I’m fine,” she said.
Her face, what little he could see of it whenever she turned her head slightly, was sallow in color. If he was to guess her age based on his observations thus far, including the brief time his arms had been wrapped around her, he would place her near forty—a little worse for wear for that age, too, perhaps—and most likely a spinster well on the shelf.
Miss Fernley’s stomach growled again, contradicting her answer to him, and she placed a hand firmly on her midriff to stifle the sound.
He sighed again. “Stay here, Miss Fernley. I’m going to get you some food.”
“You don’t need—”
“I expect you to be here when I return,” he said, interrupting her. “I have several more questions I would like you to answer, but I would prefer you be fed and coherent when you do. I will warn you though—there is nothing here for you to steal, if that is your intent. My money is safely ensconced upon my person, and there is nothing in my saddlebag but a change of clothing.”
She gave no reply, so he left the room—hisroom, he reminded himself as he made his way downstairs—that he was most likely going to have to share with a female. A total stranger. Hiswife, as far as everyone in the inn was concerned.
He spotted the owner of the White Horse behind the bar, counting the day’s receipts. The man had shown Lucas to his room earlier and would know he had arrived alone, with no mention of a wife joining him later. Lucas would have to hope the man’s many years as an innkeeper had taught him discretion.
“My lady wife is hungry,” Lucas said with no other explanation, noting that the man Miss Fernley had specifically wished to avoid was still in the public room, drinking and gaming with his friends. “And have additional water and towels sent up as well, if you please.”
“Certainly, sir,” the man replied, a knowing look in his eye. “Right away.”
