No Choice but Seduction (9 page)

They stopped long enough for Boyd to get his horse and ride off. As much as they’d like to, they couldn’t all race toward Northampton. That would attract attention. The coach was going to progress in a normal manner, while Boyd would reach the town an hour or two sooner.

Grimly thinking about what he was going to do if he got his hands on the people who did this, Boyd almost didn’t see the wild woman turning her coach around in the middle of the road. On horseback, he merely moved around the ancient vehicle, thinking the woman shouldn’t be driving if she didn’t know how to turn around without blocking the entire road.

“Wait up, mon,” the wild-haired woman shouted at him. “I’m looking for my daughter. The lass has run away from home again. Ha’ ye seen—”

Boyd didn’t stop, but shouted back, “I’ve seen no women today other than you.”

“I’m no’ that auld, mon, tae be having a grown child yet,” she called back in an offended tone.

Boyd was running out of patience. He’d already been stopped twice for directions that he couldn’t give. He was following directions himself!

So he said simply, “I’ve seen no females of any sort. Good day.” And he rode on.

He made good time after that, galloping past other vehicles going his way, avoiding those heading south. But about twenty minutes later, a red-haired gent racing down the road on a horse pulled up to hail him.

“Ha’ ye seen a Scotswomon heading this way?”

Boyd didn’t answer, he just pointed his thumb behind him and rode on. Busy road, but if anyone else tried to stop him, he might just speak with the pistol in his pocket.

Chapter Eight

G
EORDIE
C
AMERON WAS TERRIFIED.
He should just go home and leave his wife, Maisie, to her own devices. If she ever returned to Scotland, she’d find a divorce waiting for her, or a jail cell.

Sleep on it, she’d said? He’d wanted
her
to sleep on it so they could agree in the morning to take the child home and never do anything so stupid again. That was the only outcome that would allow him to forgive Maisie. But he’d woken to an empty room and a scrawled note that the child had escaped.

Well, good for her, had been his first thought, although he couldn’t imagine how she’d done it after Maisie had tied her to the bed, but he’d hoped that was the end of it.

He’d packed his bag, found that his driver and coach were waiting where they should be, and asked the innkeeper where his wife was. The man hadn’t seen her, but in a gossiping mood, mentioned that someone had come looking for an old coach that had been stolen. And that’s when the fear came back.

He was afraid his wife had gone looking for the girl again, and if she found her, that she’d continue with her extortion plans. Then Anthony Malory would find Geordie and kill him. He could envision no other outcome—unless he could find Maisie first.

He borrowed a saddle for one of his coach horses, thinking he could catch up to Maisie much quicker that way. Having to pass through Northampton slowed him down a little, since the inn they’d stayed at was on the north road out of town. But the city wasn’t as big as it might have been after a fire had destroyed most of it in 1675, and the streets had actually been widened during the rebuilding.

South was the only direction he could think to go. The child would travel in that direction to get back to London. Hopefully she hadn’t just set off down the road on foot. Maisie would find her too easily that way. But she could have gotten a ride if she was smart enough to ask someone. It was a well-traveled road, especially in the morning when produce was being brought in to market. She might even already be home. He could hope…

It was Maisie he had to find and drag home. Not that he wouldn’t take Roslynn’s daughter home if he happened to find her instead. But he’d just as soon not go anywhere near the Malorys. And a lot of travelers were on the road. He didn’t ask them all, but the few he did stop kept pointing him south. Maisie was making a nuisance of herself, apparently, according to one farmer.

But then the traffic slowed down. He’d passed several roads that went off in other directions. He was beginning to wonder if he was going the right way still. Did this road go all the way to London? He couldn’t remember from his one other time in England. And there’d been no one to ask for the last half hour. But then he saw another coach heading his way and rode quickly toward it.

Anthony Malory’s driver had been told to stop for no one, and he’d had to get nasty a couple times, to keep from slowing down. But this new traveler was persistent and rode alongside the coach for a moment to ask, “Ha’ ye seen a Scotswoman? She’d be driving a coach, I’m guessing, unless she stole a horse,” and then in a shout as the coach kept rolling by him, “Ye could ha’ just said nae, mon!”

Anthony yanked aside the coach curtain, vaguely recognizing that voice. He just caught sight of the carrot-red hair as the petitioner continued on his way down the road. That was enough for him to pound on the roof to get the driver to stop. Geordie Cameron in the same vicinity as the people who’d taken his daughter? The same man who’d gone to extremes to steal Roslynn’s fortune from her eight years ago? Coincidental? Not bloody likely.

He leapt out of the coach before it fully stopped. Geordie was still close enough that Anthony didn’t even bother grabbing his horse tied to the back of the coach. He simply raced after him and almost reached him, too. But Geordie had heard something to make him glance back. And seeing the one man he’d hoped to never see again bearing down on him…

Geordie shrieked, slammed his heels into his mount, and tore off into the woods alongside the road. Disgusted to have missed grabbing him by mere inches, Anthony ran back for his own mount.

Jeremy was out of the coach by then and even handed Anthony the reins to his horse, having witnessed the chase. He merely asked, “Who is it?”

“A dead man,” Anthony said as he mounted up and turned around to give chase. “He just doesn’t know it yet,” he added before he, too, disappeared into the woods.

His mount was a Thoroughbred. Geordie was riding a coach horse. It didn’t take long to catch up to him, yank him off his horse, and drop him on the ground.

Anthony dismounted slowly, now that he had his man. Geordie was staring up at him terrified, while trying to scoot backward.

“Wait!” Geordie shouted. “Ye mun hear me oout! It wasna me!”

It was the wrong thing to say, because it smacked of culpability. Anthony bent over to lift Geordie’s face up to his fist.

“Och, God, no’ my teeth again. Wait!”

Geordie covered his face with both arms. Anthony kicked him in the side. The arms fell away with a groan. He didn’t usually kick a man when he was down, but this pathetic worm didn’t deserve gentleman’s rules.

Anthony bent to one knee to grab a fistful of red hair before he asked, “Where is she?”

“I dinna know. I swear!”

His fist slammed into Geordie’s face for the second time. “Wrong answer, Cameron.”

“My nose!” Geordie screamed as he tried to stem the blood pouring from it. “Ye broke it again!”

“Did you think you were walking away from here?” Anthony asked. His voice was calm, even when he added, “I’m going to need a shovel by the time I’m done with you.”

“Ye can ask her! She’ll tell ye it wasna me!”

“Ask who?”

“Yer daughter—nae, dinna hit me again! It was m’wife who took her. She brought me down here tae visit her aunt, she said. Then she disappeared for the whole day and came back wi’ yer daughter. She’s oout of her mind and I tauld her sae. The lass knows I had nae part of this.”

“Then where is she?”

“I would ha’ brought her home tae ye this morn, but she escaped on her own! I’m no’ oout here looking for her, I’m looking for m’wife tae make sure
she
doesn’t find her again.”

“And what gave your wife the idea to do this?”

Geordie blanched again.

Chapter Nine

I
’M EXPECTING MY NIECE AND HER SERVANTS.
Have they arrived yet?” Boyd described Judith for the innkeeper, adding, “She’s a remarkably beautiful child. If you saw her, you’d never forget her.”