replied Marcie, clicking off the name and address of her sterling solicitor in London.
The driver guffawed.
Cole Coachman muttered something Marcie couldn't quite make out.
"What!" she hotly demanded, even as Cole Coachman took her by the arm and led her a step or two away from the driver. "I see nothing humorous in my solicitor's name and address. What is all this fuss about?"
"Pipe down, will you?" Cole Coachman demanded. "And for once and for all, cease prattling on as though you are some miss of means with more gold than you know what to do with."
"But I am!" sputtered Marcie.
"Ha," rejoined the driver, obviously listening in on their private chat. "And I be the next King of England." He laughed at his own joke.
Marcie glared around Cole Coachman's muscled bulk, staring daggers at the rotund and very obnoxious driver.
"What an impertinent little man he is," she said.
"And what a spinner of tales you are," Cole Coachman muttered. "Are you mad to make such promises? Why, he'll hunt you down—and the next generation of your family as well—if indeed you do not make good on your ridiculous promise of compensation."
"But I shall repay him," Marcie insisted. "And rest assured I have the means to do so. I am the daughter of—"
Marcie never got a chance to finish her sentence.
Suddenly, the door of the toppled coach banged open and a woman, garbed in watered silks and bundled against the cold in a stunning, fox fur carriage rug she'd wrapped about her shoulders, stood framed in the portal of the oddly pitched coach. Her hair was golden-hued and tumbled down in comely ringlets to rest in a tousled mass against the folds of her velvet pelisse. Her eyes were cobalt blue, her pouty lips red as sun-kissed cherries.
"Harry!" screeched she. "Have you left me for dead, you dim-witted fool?"
The fat little driver stiffened in obvious fear. "Good golly," he squeaked, eyes round and filled with dread. "I done forgot Miss Deirdre!"
He jammed a finger between his lips, digging out an alarming amount of tobacco, flicked the wad to the ground, then spun round to face his beautiful but very indignant mistress.
Marcie might have laughed at the comical sight but for the fact that Cole Coachman was staring with rapt attention at the stunning lady perched precariously in the doorway of the near-overturned coach.
"You might close your mouth," Marcie suggested to Cole Coachman.
He obviously hadn't heard a word she'd said. Indeed, he seemed to have forgotten her presence entirely.
Marcie frowned.
There came a flurry of excitement from the portly driver as he bustled toward the lady, took great pains to help her alight, then even stooped to brush the clinging snow from her hems. Marcie wondered why the man didn't also drop to his knees and pay homage to his golden goddess.
"Harry, you little idiot," chided the woman. "Why ever did you leave me to bump my head and then wonder if indeed I'd died and gone to h—"
The woman stopped sputtering the moment she laid eyes on the form of Cole Coachman. Suddenly, her screeching turned to a purr.
"Why, Harry, my good driver, how very remiss of you not to inform me we've tumbled across such a handsome gentleman."
Harry tugged at the collar of his too-tight coat. "He ain't no gentleman," Harry spat. "He be the driver of that there Mail coach. And his missus be the reason I ran yer coach into the bank, Miss Deirdre."
Marcie fully expected Miss Deirdre to turn on both Cole Coachman and herself with talons bared. But the wily lady did no such thing. Instead, she gave Cole Coachman a melting smile, all the while ignoring Marcie.
"My good man," purred Miss Deirdre, moving toward Cole Coachman with an obviously affected gait filled with feminine wiles. "You must forgive my driver for his slow reactions. We did not startle you, I hope. And I can only pray we did not do you, nor your horses or cargo, any harm."
Marcie found herself becoming physically ill again as Cole Coachman nearly turned to