The Dangerous Mr Ryder

‘You know where we are staying tonight, then?’

‘Why, yes, ma’am. The guv’nor doesn’t leave things to chance. All booked, right and tight on the way down, and the landlord expecting us late, so no suspicions there. It’s a nice little place used by gentlemen on hunting expeditions in the foothills, but it’s quiet now.’

Eva sank back against the squabs and fell silent. Henry was certainly not in need of setting at his ease in her presence, so, strange as it felt, she did not have to make conversation. It was curiously peaceful to realise that she had no duties, none at all, other than to survive this adventure and reach England.

‘Ma’am!’ She jerked upright, startled to find they had stopped moving and there were lights outside. ‘You’d dropped off, ma’am,’ Henry added helpfully.

‘Yes, thank you,’ Eva said repressively. Goodness knows what sort of appearance she must present with her gown crumpled, her cloak filthy and her hair all over the place. She pushed it back and pulled her hood up to shadow her face as best she could. People saw what they expected to see, and this innkeeper would not be expecting a weary traveller to be his grand duchess. She must just be careful to do nothing to attract his attention.

The door opened, Jack helped her down and the landlord came bustling out to greet them, cheerfully prepared for their arrival at this late hour.

‘Welcome, sir, welcome, madam! Come along inside, if you please.’ Eva let the familiar local patois wash over her as the horses were sent off to the stables, their luggage carried in and Henry vanished in the direction of the taproom. ‘The room is just as you ordered, sir. The bed has been aired and I am sure your wife will be comfortable.’

The man led the way up the stairs. Eva stopped dead at the bottom, the last traces of sleep banished. ‘Room? Wife? Which room are you in?’

‘Ours.’ Jack took her arm and began to climb. Without actual violence she had no option but to follow him. ‘Thank you.’ He took the branch of candles from the landlord’s hand and pushed her gently through the open door at the head of the stairs. ‘This looks excellent. Some hot water, if you will.’

Eva stood in the middle of the room and looked around. One dresser, two chairs, a rug before a cold grate, a clothes press, a screen and a bed. One bed. ‘And just where are you sleeping?’ she enquired icily. Beneath her bodice her heart was thudding like a military tattoo.

‘With you. In that bed. Why? Where else do you expect me to sleep?’

Chapter Five

‘I expect you to sleep in your own bed, in your own room.’ Her mouth had gone dry, her stomach was full of butterflies.

‘I am your bodyguard. I need to be close to you.’ He was touching the flame to the other candles in the room, his hand steady as he did so. Eva felt her irrational panic building. What was she afraid of? That he would ravish her? Ridiculous. Somehow common sense did not stop the unsettling physical reactions.

‘Then sleep on the floor.’ She pointed to the far corner, hidden behind a screen.

‘Why should I be so uncomfortable?’ Jack enquired. ‘The role of the modern bodyguard does not include sleeping at your threshold like a faithful troubadour. I have had a long hard day. That looks like a very large, very comfortable bed. I’ll put the bolster down the middle of it if that would make you feel any better.’

The click as he turned the key in the lock brought the panic bubbling closer to the surface. ‘It is scandalous,’ she stated. ‘I am—’

‘My wife,’ Jack said, turning from the door to face her across the expanse of snowy-white quilt. There was not a trace of amusement on his face. ‘For the rest of this journey you act, think, live as my wife.’

‘No!’

‘Eva, what are you afraid of? Do you think I am going to insist on my conjugal rights? That would be carrying the deception a little too far. This is for your safety.’ It was not a small room, but his masculine presence seemed to fill it. Part of her mind registered that he had called her by her first name; part of it dismissed that as an irrelevance. The forefront of her consciousness was full of the reality that she was going to have to spend this night, and goodness knows how many nights after it, in bed with this man.

‘Of course I do not think that.’ She was fighting not to think of it! ‘And I am not afraid of you.’ She tilted her chin haughtily and tried to stare him down.

No, she was not afraid of him, she was afraid of what he was reminding her she missed, afraid that every hour spent with him would tear away a little more of the screen she had erected round her needs and desires. Afraid that she might turn to him in the night for strength and comfort and…It was easy to resist temptation when it was not a fingertip away, easy to ignore yearnings when there was no way of satisfying them.

‘You are tired. We both are. They will bring hot water up soon and you can wash and go to bed.’ As he spoke there was a tap at the door. Eva watched, startled, as Jack slid a knife from his boot and went to open the door. By the time the little maid had come in with the pitcher of water, the knife was out of sight. He turned the key in the lock again once she was gone and gestured towards the washstand and screen. ‘Go on.’ He lifted her valise and placed it behind the painted wooden panels.

‘Thank you.’ Eva forced the words out of stiff lips and stepped past him into the fragile privacy. She was going to have to use her cloak as a dressing gown. Her hands shook as she delved into the valise, but she lifted out the scanty contents, shook out the one spare gown he had allowed her and sorted through the rest. Oh, no!

‘Mr Ryder.’ It was the tone she used to point out some grave dereliction of court protocol and it normally produced a reaction of instant, anxious, attention on the part of the person so addressed.

‘Yes?’ His voice sounded muffled, but unconcerned. Eva had a momentary vision of his shirt being pulled off over his head and turned her back on the join in the screen panels resolutely. For a moment she had wanted to peep, like some giggling maidservant spying on the grooms.

‘When you took those things out of my valise at the castle, you apparently removed my nightgown. What, exactly, do you expect me to sleep in?’ If she hadn’t been so angry, she would have considered her words more carefully. As it was, there was a long silence from the other side of the screen. He is laughing at me, the beast, she decided grimly, just as a white linen garment was tossed on top of the screen.

‘Have one of my shirts.’

‘You have plenty, I assume?’

‘Of course, I knew how long I was packing for.’ He is laughing. Eva fumed as she stripped off and washed hastily, then dragged the shirt over her head. It came midway down her thighs, the cuffs dangling well below her fingertips. She pulled it down as much as possible, rolled up the cuffs and unpinned her hair. At least he had left her hairbrush in the case.

The long, regular strokes had the soothing power of routine. She did the requisite one hundred and hesitated, half-tempted to do another set. Then another. She braided it hastily. ‘Where are you, Mr Ryder?’

‘In bed.’

‘Then close your eyes.’

‘Very well. They are closed. Will you snuff out the candles?’

A cautious look around the edge of the screen revealed that Jack was indeed in bed, his eyes closed as promised. There was no doubting that he was awake somehow; he seemed to radiate alertness. The covers were pulled up to his chin, not giving her any hint as to what he might—or might not—be wearing and the odd lump down the centre of the bed showed that he had inserted the bolster as a gesture to modesty.

Eva emerged, resisted the undignified urge to scuttle from candle to candle and then dive into bed, and instead went round carefully snuffing each until the bed itself was just a white glimmer in the room. She slid under the sheet, pulling it up tight to her throat.

‘Good night, Eva.’

No more ma’am, not until they reached safety. It was a curiously liberating thought. ‘Good night,’ she responded coldly. Jack. Liberating, or dangerous? Protocol was a straitjacket, but it was also an armour. Behind it one could maintain a perfect reserve, perfect privacy for the emotions. This adventure was going to throw her into an intimacy of thoughts and fears with this man that was at least as perilous as any physical closeness.

She should have been exhausted, ready to drop into sleep the moment her lids closed. The bed was comfortable, clean, and there was the reassuring touch of the bolster down her spine to remind her that she did not need to fear turning and touching Jack in the night. Of course she trusted him, and really, it was no different to him sleeping on the floor on the far side of the room, she told herself stoutly.

So why could she not sleep? Eva closed her eyes and tried to relax, starting with her toes and working up. She tried counting sheep, reciting recipes, recalling Italian irregular verbs. Hopeless.

Was he asleep? She held her breath to listen to his, steady and even. There was an interruption as he shifted slightly, a soft sigh, then the even rhythm resumed. Jack Ryder was obviously one of those infuriating people who could sleep anywhere, under any circumstances. She just hoped he would wake up as quickly if danger threatened.

Eva turned her thoughts resolutely to her son, her lips curving into a smile as she did so. How soon before she could see him? He would have grown so much. What new clothes would he need? Would he look more like his father now as he grew up, or less? Would he still throw himself into her arms to be kissed, or was he too grown up for that now? Without realising it, she relaxed and drifted off to sleep.

Jack opened his eyes on to darkness and lay still, trying to work out what had woken him. Eva’s breathing was soft and regular, she was lying curled up with her back turned and had managed to push the bolster a good three-quarters of the way across the bed towards him. A woman used to sleeping alone.

Distantly a dog was barking, the bored yap of a lonely animal, not the aggression of a threatened one. The yard below was silent. He dredged into his mind and came up with the sound of a closing door outside. It must be about three o’clock—who was abroad at this time? He had chosen this inn, a hunters’ favourite off the main road, for its isolation.

He eased out of the bed, pulling on his breeches before taking four silent strides to the window. He unlatched the shutter, pushed it back and stood looking down until his eyes adjusted to what dim light there was. Minutes passed, then he saw a familiar figure come out of the shadow of the stable opposite and walk across the yard. In the centre the man stopped and looked up, directly into his eyes, although he could not have seen Jack.

He eased the window wide and leaned out. ‘What’s the matter?’ He pitched the whisper to reach Henry and no further.

‘Nothing,’ the groom hissed. ‘I was restless.’

Jack raised a hand in acknowledgement and silently closed the window again. Henry was lying, of course, he had probably been prowling about every half-hour or so throughout the night. He never seemed to need much sleep—the result, he claimed, of becoming accustomed to very little when he was a prisoner of war.

The man drifted out of sight as soundlessly as he had appeared. Jack turned to go back to bed and found himself face to face with a white spectre. ‘What the hell!’

It was Eva, of course. How she had got out of bed and across the room without him hearing her was a worry—was he losing his sharpness of hearing, the instinct that warned him of danger? But, of course, Eva was not a danger. Not, at least, in the sense that she was likely to knife him in the back.