AllFreeNovel
Share Us
He looked as though he meant to argue further, to press the matter of ending our bickering. After a moment, he sighed. “Yes. I wrote to her shortly after making arrangements with you to travel home, though she will not expect us quite yet. If I know my mother, she had your room prepared the moment she received my letter, so do not fear that you will arrive without a place to sleep.”
“I did not worry about that. Chelton does not lack for bedchambers.” Though I quite understated the matter. Chelton was a grand, palladian house nestled in the rolling hills of Cumberland, just outside of a town called Bakewell. It was deserving of the grandeur and praise it received, and in all my travels, I had not yet met its equal in stately beauty.
“You know,” he said quietly. “You are much more pleasant after I provide you with something to eat. Perhaps if I carry about apples or cheese and ply you with them, we can become friends.”
My surprise was quickly engulfed by amusement, for he was correct. I’d offered to share the bed after he brought me dinner, and I was far more polite after he’d brought me breakfast. “You propose to treat me as you would a horse? A few extra treats to entice good behavior?”
“Why not? If it works, then I see no harm in it. You should not either, for it supplies you with extra treats.”
“I cannot refuse a plan that provides me with treats, of course. Perhaps if they are delicious enough, I will even neigh for you.”
“Like a horse?”
“Do not sound so disbelieving. Unlike your failure with the chicken trill, I can sound exactly like a horse.”
Benedict laughed. His eyes glittered in the dark carriage, his white teeth gleaming. His smile had a remarkable effect on my body, and I was glad when he did not continue the conversation, for I did not know how I was meant to continue fortifying my feelings when he so easily disarmed me.
We fell into silence for the remainder of the journey, and it was only a few hours later, in the darkness of the middle of the night, that we rode quietly over the stone bridge and up the gravel drive toward Chelton. Benedict and I were both silent when we climbed from the carriage. I waited for him to pay Charlie the remainder of the money owed to the man and retrieve our bags, then watched him heave my trunk from the boot and set it on the ground.
Benedict looked up at Chelton’s pale stone facade, the windows dark and the stone stairs split from the front door and sweeping down two ways. I hefted my valise up and moved to take my trunk as the carriage rolled away.
“It is too heavy,” Benedict said quietly. The stillness of night made every sound more pronounced.
“I can manage it.”
He folded his arms over his chest and leaned back, his body speaking the words floating in his mind:this should be entertaining.
I leaned down, took the trunk firmly in my hands, and hefted it up. The weight strained against my hold. I could lift it, but I could see how correct Benedict had been—I certainly would not be able to carry it up the stairs and into the house. I’d walked two steps before my arms screamed in protest, and I bent to set it on the ground.
“Allow me,” he said with a heavy dose of smugness.
“That certainly sounds like a man hoping to mend our differences.”
He growled, low in his throat, and lifted the trunk easily. “You were correct. It was a pointless idea.”
Something about the way he so easily gave up on me stung, but I brushed it away. The choice I had made to keep myself distanced from him was wise—safeguarding, even. I took Benedict’s valise from the ground and followed him up the stairs. For his plan to work, we needed to wake in our bedchambers, where the servants would find us asleep in the morning. They would assume, we hoped, that our chaperone had left with the hired carriage.
We made it quietly to the front door. Benedict set the trunk down and tried to open it, but it would not budge. He looked from the door to me, and I saw for the first time a bit of worry knit his brows. “It’s locked.”
Chapter10
BENEDICT
“Did you not expect this?” Thea asked, looking at me with mild alarm.
I tried the door again, but it did not budge. “I’ve returned home in the middle of the night before and never encountered this particular dilemma.” I looked up. “Perhaps the servants’ entrance is unlocked.”
Thea glanced to her trunk.
“Leave the bags and come with me,” I said. I did not want to carry that trunk around the perimeter of the house, only to be forced to climb through a window or something equally ungainly. It was far too heavy, and we could return to retrieve it once we made it inside the house.
“I can wait here,” she whispered.
Blasted prideful woman. I turned on my heel, her earlier rejection still stinging with gentle consistency. I had thought we were getting along well after a few days of one another’s company, but apparently Thea was too stubborn to put our differences aside and admit that we could very well be friends—if she chose. “As you wish.”
I had only made it halfway down the stone stairs when I heard her following. I shook my head and waited at the bottom for Thea to reach me.
“It’s too dark to wait alone,” she said.
