Page 84 of The Heart of an Earl

Des coughed. His stare eating her from the inside out.

She looked to the driver, pasting a smile on her face. All conventions aside, Jules knew that the driver had seen much more promiscuous behavior with Lady Hewton and wouldn’t bat an eye at her riding off with a man alone. The situation was helped by the fact that Jules was a spinster and had no reputation to worry on. “No, it will be most convenient to have Lord Troubant accompany me to Lady Hewton’s estate. If you think you can spare a lap blanket for me to borrow?”

The driver frowned for a long second.

“It is most practical for how ill I am feeling,” she offered to ease his worry.

He looked back to Des one last time, and then nodded to the footman to pull the steps. “As you wish, m’lady.”

Des dismounted, waited for her to alight from the carriage and then lifted her onto his horse. She tugged the lap blanket about her shoulders as he mounted, trying not to cringe in front of the driver as Des set his arms about her, grabbing the reins.

Silently, they moved down the road as the carriage reversed course behind them.

Ten minutes past the point where they were out of sound range, Des leaned down to her ear, his voice rabid. “What in the blasted hell are you doing running out on me?”

She hadn’t seen it from the carriage. The shake in his arms, the quivering of his bones.

He was livid. Livid beyond the pale.

But he had no idea what livid was. And he was about to find out.

“Let me off this horse.” Her voice hissed into the still darkness.

“So you can run again? I don’t think so. I had a devil of a time finding where you’d disappeared to as it was.”

She pulled her right leg up and grabbed the dagger strapped to her outer calf. Her body twisting, her face spun to him, her look piercing him as the tip of the dagger went under his chin. “Let me off this damn horse, Des, or I will jump.”

His top lip twitched in fury and he jerked on the reins, stopping the horse.

The second the mount’s hooves stilled, she shoved his arm away and slid down the side of the horse, landing with a thud on the cold ground, the vibration of the impact surging up through her thin slippers and into her toes and feet, threatening to crack her bones.

“You carry a blade again.”

“Yes.” The word seethed out as she shifted onto the outside edges of her feet to buffer the shock on her bones.

“Why?”

Pulling her shoulders straight, her look sent daggers up at him. “The world is not safe. I only believed in that idiotic thought for a very short time. I’ll not be without a blade again.”

Des glared down at her. “Where do you think you’re going, Jules? There isn’t anything out here for miles.”

“I’m not going anywhere, but I’m also not about to speak to you when I’m at the mercy of being captive in your arms.”

He stared down at her for a long second, then heaved a sigh and slid off the horse, moving to the side of the road to drop the reins around the branch of a tree.

He paused by the horse for a long second, not turning back to her. “You bloody well left me, Jules.”

“And you have a blasted wife. Did you not think I would see that? Did you not think I might be upset at the fact that you just tossed up my skirts and then left me without a word to run out after her?”

Clasping the blanket closed at her neck with her left hand, she bent to tuck the dagger into the sheath on her calf. He turned around to her and she straightened, her right hand flying upward at her side. “What did you expect, Des? For me to wait around in the cold for you to meander back to me? To stand in that ballroom and watch as you danced with her? Talked with her? In what bloody scenario do you see me standing around and witnessing that? Because it isn’t going to happen—I’m not your mistress. You may not respect me enough for that, but I respect me. And I’ll not be your trollop.”

“Jules—”

“And who in the hell even are you? Lord Troubant? Where did that come from?”

His palms lifted to her, wary. “Can you slow down for just one second, Jules? You have this all wrong.”

She yanked the red lap blanket higher around her shoulders and clasped her arms in front of her. “Do I?”

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