His Runaway Maiden Read Online Free PDF Page A

thought of Harry and recalled how when he had rescued him that he had been unable to remember whether he had once had siblings. Harry’s earliest memory was of the cupboard-like space on the ship, where he had woken with a sore head and a frightening loss of identity.
    Alex’s thoughts were interrupted by his sudden awareness that Master Wood must have dozed off. His head was going bump, bump, bump against his shoulder. Alex reached behind him and seized the front of the youth’s doublet and bellowed at him to rouse himself.
    Rosamund started awake and at first could not think where she was and then the motion of the horse and the scent of the man filled her nostrils. She realised that her face was squashed against his shoulder and she found herself breathing in the smell of sandalwood and his maleness with an unfamiliar pleasure. Then she realised he was holding on to the material at her chest. Feeling hot all over, she tugged herself free. What if he had felt her breast despite the binding? Her secret would be out.
    ‘Stay awake, Master Wood,’ ordered Alex. ‘What good is a sleeping guide to me?’
    Rosamund said gruffly, ‘It will not happen again.’
    ‘It had better not.’
     
    After that incident Rosamund made certain that she stayed awake. It amazed her that she had managed to fall asleep in such a precarious position and in the company of this foreigner who had threatened her. She forced herself to concentrate on anything but him. She gazed at the frosty landscape and recalled the only time she had travelled to London.
    It had been in the company of her father, stepmother andWilliam. Edward was getting married and Rosamund could not help but pity his future wife, Marion. She remembered how besotted the new Mistress Fustian had been with her husband. Such adoration had not survived. Last time Marion had visited Appleby Manor with their two daughters, Rosamund had noticed the bruising on her neck and wrists. Edward wanted a son and his wife suffered for what he called her lack of success.
    It was that kind of behaviour that caused Rosamund to consider spinsterhood preferable to marrying a man such as her stepbrother, although her stepmother had once suggested such a possibility. A long-suppressed memory reared its dragon-like head and she quickly quashed it. There were some things it was better not to dwell upon and fortunately her father had been against such a match.
     
    The temperature had dropped by the time they crossed the border into the Palatine of Chester and the sun had disappeared below the horizon. Soon it would be dark and Rosamund was worried. Surely they should have reached an inn by now, but the road stretched ahead of them with no sign of a building.
    Alex’s thoughts were running in a similar direction and he twisted in the saddle to speak to his travelling companion. He had difficulty in making out the slender features beneath the brim of the hat. ‘Have you any idea where the nearest inn is, Master Wood?’
    ‘It is some time since I passed this way,’ answered Rosamund. ‘I was certain we should have reached the one I had in mind by now, but I must be mistaken. Still, I amcertain if we continue along this road then we will come to another sooner or later.’
    ‘If this is the main London road, then that is likely,’ said Alex, exacerbated. ‘I would know how far we have to go.’
    ‘I cannot help you with exact distances.’ She felt irritated by the tone of his voice. ‘We must just travel on.’
    ‘So be it,’ he growled. ‘Let us hope we don’t have to sleep in the open.’
    The idea alarmed her, but she remained silent, not wishing to annoy him further by complaining. Visions of mulled wine, hot broth and a warm bed began to float before her eyes and she was tempted to snuggle into his back to keep warm. She resisted and somehow managed to remain upright.
    They continued along the road, watching the silhouettes of trees and hedges merge into the darkness and stars prick