As he wound a path between the crowd of tables and chairs spread out across the tavern, Jared heard chair legs scrape hard on the floor nearby, followed by a bellow of rage from a barrel-chested man in worn knickers and a sodden linen shirt sporting grease stains from a week’s worth of tavern meals.
“Ye little whoreson! Ye spilt me ale all over me. I’ll teach ye to be more careful!” the gap-toothed giant growled and took a swipe at a wide-eyed Ariana.
Jared halted the blow only inches from Ari’s beautiful face. He flung Greaser’s fist back with enough force to spin the plus-sized goon halfway around.
A squeal sounded to his left, and Ariana’s fists came up as she charged forward. He palmed her head, shouted “No!” and shoved her back in time for him to block a solid blow from his new nemesis. Greaser hit like a prizefighter.
Jared blocked a second blow, then landed two rapid-fire jabs to Greaser’s jaw, the last hard enough to drop him back into his chair.
“Touch the lad, and I promise you’ll regret it!” he snarled.
“What’s he to ye? Ye’re a nob, and he looks to be a stable boy.”
“He’s my—” Jared looked over at Ariana who was staring at him wide-eyed like she had seen a ghost.
One of Greaser’s friends made a grab for Ari, and Jared yanked her close, tucked her under his arm. “He’s my little brother,” Jared told Greaser, “so you tell your friend like I am telling you—if you want to see the sun rise tomorrow, you’ll leave us alone.”
Greaser’s eyes narrowed. “Who are ye?”
Damn! This was just what he didn’t need—attention. He could not tell them he was the Duke of Reston. Ducal younger brothers did not parade around dressed like servants. To say nothing of the fact assassins might be in the area and searching for the Reston duke at this very moment.
“He is my friend,” a voice boomed in the tavern, followed by a nasty-sounding growl, “and I am the Earl of Dexter.” The earl stepped forward, flanked by Bullen on one side and Harry on the other, teeth bared.
Greaser shrank back in his chair, as did his mate. The inn’s owner charged in from the kitchen. “See ’ere now! We don’t let no dogs in ’ere. What the devil is goin’ on?”
He stopped dead in his tracks when he got a good look at Dexter. “Yer lordship! Mighty good to see ye again.”
“I wish I could say the same, Bingham. Your two patrons here have accosted my friends.” Dexter flung a hand toward Greaser and his mate.
“Out of my tavern!” Bingham ordered the two troublemakers. “Ye can come back when the earl and his friends is gone.”
“We didn’t know he were a lord, Bingham,” Greaser’s mate whined as the two shuffled toward the door.
“Ask next time. Now get out!” Bingham turned back to the earl. “Would that be yer dog as well, m’lord?”
Dexter nodded. “And the dog stays with us for now. We shall take him out later.”
The innkeeper sighed and with a poorly masked grimace of distaste, scuttled back to the bar. “Come on back ’ere, your lordship, and I will get ye keys to yer rooms. I’ve only two rooms left. Viscount Brumley and his party took the other three.”
Dexter winced, flicked a quick glance at Jared, and answered, “Two is fine.”
Jared grabbed at Dexter’s arm. “Wait a minute.”
“When we get upstairs,” Dexter hissed, low enough only Jared could hear. Ari glowered at Dexter as well.
“Here’s yer keys,” Bingham said and handed two over. “Yer rooms are the two closest to the back stairs.”
Dexter paid the innkeeper for the rooms and for four meals in the tavern since the viscount’s party had taken over the only private dining room, and their foursome was not about to join them.
“We will freshen up in our rooms first and then come back down for our meals,” Dexter told the innkeeper, then motioned to the rest of them. “Gentlemen, shall we?”
The earl herded his unhappy group up the stairs, Harry padding along behind them. He opened the door nearest the back stairs. The room was tiny even by posting inn standards and held a bed, a washstand with a pitcher and some cloths, and a rickety-looking chair with rockers attached. Once everyone had entered, he shut the door with a quiet click, faced his mutinous group, and held up a hand to slow their imminent retorts.
“Before you three explode, consider the logic of our choice. One, we want as little attention as possible—especially with Viscount Brumley occupying the same inn—though after Reston’s little dustup, we have already attracted too much attention.”
Jared opened his mouth to speak, but Dexter kept going. “Two, there were only two rooms available. No real choice exists, other than Lady Ariana in one room and the three of us in another. Though as you can see”—his hand swept an arc over the room—“there is no room for three unless one sleeps on the floor. And no room for the dog.”
Harry returned Dexter’s baleful glare with a sad-eyed dog face as though he knew he had been insulted.
“I will sleep on the floor,” Bullen offered.
“And three”—Dexter went on as though Bullen had not spoken—“brothers will be expected to room together. A little ragamuffin brother sleeping alone while big brother crowds the earl will attract immediate attention. Thanks to you, Reston, for informing the entire tavern that Lady Ariana was your little brother.” He glowered his disapproval at Jared.
“And we eat downstairs,” the earl went on, “because the only thing guaranteed to attract even more attention is three grown men eating in their rooms with a young boy when there is no good reason not to go downstairs. Thank you, but I don’t care to have a rumor start about me being a molly with a preference for boys, and I am in no mood to be thwarted.”
“Watch your mouth!” Jared barked.
“My apologies for the language, Lady Ariana. I am a bit distraught by our situation.”
“It’s all right, Lord Dexter. My father spared me nothing in my education. I am fully aware of what a molly is.”
“Bloody hell, even worse,” he muttered.
Jared could see the earl was coldly furious and realized every point Dexter had made was true.
“So what now?” Ari asked in a too-small voice, and Jared’s gut clenched.
Dexter heaved a deep and thoroughly disgusted sigh. “There is no help for it. The two brothers will have to stay together.”
Chapter Thirteen
“The two brothers will have to stay together…”
Jared heard the words, but it took a couple seconds for his brain to fully comprehend he would be sharing a room with Ari tonight. His heart squeezed with excitement right before the blanket of dread dropped to his shoulders. This was not the twenty-first century where men and women spent the night together after only a few dates—or no dates. Hell, men could not even ask a woman to dance in this century without a formal introduction by an appropriate person. His libido may jump for joy at the prospect, but spending the night in the same room with Ari had disaster written all over it—his.
“Have you lost your mind?” Jared hissed, careful to keep his voice low with the inn’s paper-thin walls.
“No, and we must make doubly sure everyone in this inn thinks Lady Ariana is a young boy,” Dexter went on as though Jared had not exploded. “No room for mistakes or—”
“—she will be ruined,” Jared finished glumly.
“Well, thanks to your heroics in the taproom below, every eye in this inn is on the four of us now.”
“What would you have had me do? Let the drunken arse strike Ariana?”
“Lady Ariana, and of course not,” Dexter said, refusing the bait. “You had to step in, but in doing so, our situation has altered. We must change our plans accordingly.”
“So you have decided Ari and I must stay together in this room for the night,” Jared said angrily.
“I’m standing right here.” Ari stepped between them and glared at Jared. “So you can stop discussing me as if I were not. I won’t let anyone
discover I am a girl.”
“And if they do?” he snapped at her.
No help for it, he was angry. He wanted Ari away from here and safe. He should have left her behind at Wakefield, but if the earl was right about the highwaymen…Hell, the bastards had admitted to having people in his own county watching Haverly. He groaned inwardly. What if the bastards had watched the four of them depart Wakefield this morning?
She swallowed hard. “Then I deal with the consequences.”
“Your ruination, you mean,” Jared retorted.
“Quite,” Dexter added, “and then someone will have to marry her to salvage her reputation.” He gave Jared the nineteenth-century version of the stink-eye.
Good Lord!
He glanced up at the beamed ceiling, took a deep breath, then eyed Dexter.
I can’t afford to antagonize him at this juncture. I need him. Nor can I offer to marry Ari since I’m headed back to the twenty-first century the first chance I get.
The only thing worse than ruination by scandal in the Regency era was a husband deserting a wife, never to be seen again. And yet the idea of deserting her made a sharp pain stab right near his heart. Worse still, the idea of marrying Ari held merit. Why the bloody hell had he finally found a woman he could live with happily, only two hundred years too soon?
He took a chance and glanced at Ari. She stared like a deer in headlights, as the Yanks liked to say.
“We shall make do,” he assured her. “Everything will be all right. Not to worry.”
Her brows rumpled together. “I am not worried about me. I am worried about you.”
“Me?”
“You will be forced to keep your hands to yourself,” she said with her too-innocent eyes.
Dexter groaned. “I do not need to hear this.”
Bullen made a choking sound under his breath.
Jared glowered at her.
“I could trade rooms later…” Dexter offered.
Jared shot him a look fit to kill. “Not a deuced chance.” He turned to Ari. “We will be fine.”
She stared at him, her expression inscrutable.
Dear Lord! Did she think him so libidinous he was capable of seducing her in a public inn with paper-thin walls and with Bullen and Dex next door?
Judging by the look she was giving him, that was exactly what she thought.
Oh, blast it!
He had done nothing to give anyone the impression he was an untrustworthy blighter. No, but Seven surely had—the wanker—playing the consummate rake in this day and time.
Jared needed to focus—get back on point. The highwaymen were part of a conspiracy to eliminate his existence here. Seven may never be coming back, and Jared had to set plans in motion for the care of his tenants and holdings before he disappeared back to the twenty-first century.
“I meant it!” he repeated to Ari. “We shall be fine.”
“It’s time we went downstairs for our supper. The innkeeper will wonder what is taking us so long,” Dexter said, then turned to Ariana. “Try not to say anything at all. Your voice hardly sounds masculine even for fourteen or however old you are supposed to be.”
“Who the hell put you in charge?” Jared wanted to know.
“I’m the one with the connections to help us through this mess,” Dexter retorted. “You have conveniently forgotten whatever connections you may have had.”
“He’s got a point,” Bullen muttered next to him.
And blast it, the earl did. Jared kept forgetting his supposed amnesia. If he was not careful, he would make a hash of this. So, he shut his mouth and followed Dexter and his little gang downstairs.
Thankfully, their small group found a table in the corner of the tavern and ate their meal without incident, though every occupant in the tavern cast furtive glances their direction, which only sealed the smug look on Dexter’s face. There would be no getting out of sharing a room with Ariana for the night. Not and manage to keep her masquerade in play. She had been good to her word and said naught throughout the meal, just watched Jared as though waiting for him to fly off half-cocked.
He had to admit just the thought of them alone together in the dark for hours sent his blood skirting to his nether regions, which he could not afford else he be forced to parade out of the tavern with a stiff willy. Still, the thought of being alone with her in that tiny room made his heart pound and his palms clammy. He’d had more than his share of beautiful women in his time, far ahead in the future, so why did this little slip of a girl in the Regency era make him wonky? She made him feel protective, primitive, and foolishly young all at the same time. He dared not let her know.
What if she guessed how crazy she made him? He could not allow that to happen, could not allow her that much control. Down that road lay heartbreak.
Bullen had taken Harry outside when they came downstairs for dinner and returned alone, no doubt having tethered the dog in the stable for the night. Now that the meal had ended, Dexter and Bullen followed him and Ari back out of the tavern and up the stairs. As expected, every eye had turned with their exit, and with the last half of the upstairs corridor open and visible to the tavern patrons below—since their rooms were closest to the rear stairs—every eye waited to see the matchup for rooms.
Dexter and Bullen hesitated at their door. “I say we set up a watch to be sure no one comes up the outside stairs,” the earl said, careful to keep his voice low.
He and Bullen nodded. Ari started to object, and Jared hissed, “The highwaymen had people watching Haverly. They could have been watching Wakefield as well.”
She snapped her lips shut and nodded. She had obviously forgotten the highwaymen had accomplices in the country. One of the reasons her father had wanted to hie her off to London.
“Reston, you take first watch,” Dexter whispered. “In two hours, I will knock on the wall to let you know I am on. Bullen will take the final two hours.”
Bullen nodded his assent.
“We want to be gone before dawn and before everyone here awakens.”
“Fine,” Jared agreed. “Wake us in the morning when you are ready to leave.”
Dexter glowered at him. Jared’s wake us comment must have sounded like shared sleeping quarters, as in the same bed.
“If you try anything—” Dexter snarled.
“Then I shall scream, and you and Bullen come running,” Ari offered cheerfully.
“No!” Dexter, Bullen, and Jared hissed in unison. Eyes glanced up from the tavern below.
“The entire inn would come running,” Dexter whispered harshly. “He won’t bother you, or he’ll find himself facing pistols at dawn.”
Ariana gasped and quickly covered when the tavern eyes turned to the second floor again.
“No need to get so dramatic,” Jared hissed at Dexter, “and I take exception to your implication.”
“Good.”
Jared quietly closed the door and snicked the feeble lock into place.
“That wouldn’t keep a child out,” he muttered.
“Are you worried Dexter can get past the lock?” Ari asked, her cheeks flushing bright pink.
“Now, you are going to accuse me of ungentlemanly behavior, too?”
Even the dim candlelight could not hide the guilt in her eyes. “I am sorry. I shouldn’t have said that.”
“You’re right. I have given you no reason to think—”
She raised skeptical brows.
“Well, except for those few kisses.” He cleared his throat. “You liked them, too. You cannot deny it.”
Her lips twitched as she fought back the smile that angered him for some reason, and he felt like an errant schoolboy and probably looked like one with his brows indignantly bunched.
“No, I cannot deny it.”
Instead of feeling smug at being right, her words sent his blood racing to places off-limits—at least for now.
“But that doesn’t mean—”
He held up a hand. “Please, no more swipes at my
character. I’ve had all I can take this evening.”
She snapped her lips together, then grinned.
“Best take your boots off to be comfortable.” She opened her mouth to object again, and he added, “Since you are unlikely to remove anything else with the two of us locked in here.”
The opportunity to tease him in his misery must have overwhelmed her. “Well, actually I could, but I won’t.”
He groaned. “Do not leave me with that particular movie running in my head and my two-hour first watch to face.”
“Movie? What do you mean? What is a—”
“Did I say movie? I meant movement,” he said before she could finish. He scrubbed a palm over his face. His head had begun to ache.
“Are you all right?”
“Fine,” he bit out. “Just leave—”
“Leave you alone? Fine.” She went over and sat on the bed.
“What I was going to say was just leave your boots by the bed. Close by in case we need to leave in a hurry.”
“That is a lie, but it was sweet of you to be concerned about my feelings. The old Jared wouldn’t have given a baker’s tart about them. Or any other kind.” She giggled at her own humor.
“What’s so funny?”
“Oh nothing. Just that we seem to have made a mull of things, I suppose.”
“I do not see anything funny about it,” he grumbled.
“You wouldn’t, but I cannot get these boots off without help. They belong to Aidan, our stable boy, and the fit is a bit too tight.”
“Yes, of course.”
Jared came over and knelt next to the bed, then took her booted foot in his hand. He swore he could feel the warmth of her leg right through the leather, but that was impossible. Tell that to the blood raging through his veins and heading south, like the River Kennet at flood stage.
She surreptitiously wiped her palms on the worn linen coverlet, and he hid a smile. So, he was not the only one affected by their tenuous situation.
He slid his big hand up behind her knee and used the other to tug at the heel of the boot. The leather made a slow sensuous slide down her calf, or was that his hand? He couldn’t think for the hammering of his heart against his ribs. He could not tell who flinched first at the feel of his hand behind her knee—him or Ari. This was too much to bear—him perched between her trouser-bedecked legs with the tent in his falls quite visible.
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