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Chapter One
YORKSHIRE, ENGLAND
SEPTEMBER 1760
After the carriage wreck and a bit before the horses ran away, Lady Georgina Maitland noticed that her land steas a man Well, that is to say, naturally she knew Harry Pye was a man She wasn’t under the delusion that he was a lion or an elephant or a whale, or indeed any other do fish What she meant was that his maleness had suddenly become very evident
George knit her brow as she stood in the desolate high road leading to East Riding in Yorkshire Around theray horizon Dark was rapidly falling, brought on early by the rainstor at the ends of the earth
“Do you consider a whale to be an ani fish, Mr Pye?” she shouted into the wind
Harry Pye’s shoulders bunched They were covered only by a wet lawn shirt that clung to hi way He’d previously discarded his coat and waistcoat to help John Coache
“An animal, my lady” Mr Pye’s voice was, as always, even and deep with a sort of gravelly tone toward the bottom
George had never heard him raise his voice or show passion in any way Not when she’d insisted on acco him to her Yorkshire estate; not when the rain had started, slowing their travel to a crawl; not when the carriage had overturned twenty o
How very irritating “Do you think you will be able to right the carriage?” She pulled her soaked cloak up over her chin as she conte fro in the wind, theels were sle It was a thoroughly idiotic question
Mr Pye didn’t indicate by action or word that he are of the silliness of her query “No, my lady”
George sighed
Really, it was so of a miracle that they and the coachman hadn’t been hurt or killed The rain had made the roads slippery with e had started to slide Fro as he tried to steady the vehicle Harry Pye had leapt froe cat He’d braced hiainst her before she could even utter a word His warmth had surrounded her, and her nose, buried intimately in his shirt, had inhaled the scent of clean linen and e had tilted, and it was obvious they were falling into the ditch
Slowly, awfully, the contraption had tipped over with a grinding crash The horses had whinnied fro its fate She’d clutched Mr Pye’s coat as her world upended, and Mr Pye grunted in pain Then they were still again The vehicle had rested on its side, and Mr Pye rested on her like a great warm blanket Except Harry Pye was much firmer than any blanket she’d ever felt before
He’d apologized led himself from her, and climbed up the seat to wrest open the door above thee rubbed the wrist he’d gripped He was disconcertingly strong—one would never know it to look at hi from his arm and she wasn’t a petite woman
The coachave a shout, which was snatched away by the wind, but it was enough to bring her back to the present Thewas free
“Ride her to the next town, Mr Coachman, if you will,” Harry Pye directed “See if there is another carriage to send back I’ll remain here with her ladyship”
The coach into the downpour
“How far is the next town?” George asked
“Ten or fifteen miles” He pulled a strap loose on one of the horses
She studied him as he worked Aside from the wet, Harry Pye didn’t look any different than he had when they’d started out this e height Rather lean His hair was brown—-neither chestnut nor auburn,to dress it with pomades or powder And he wore brown: breeches, waistcoat, and coat, as if to careen that soave him any color
“It’s just that I’e muttered
Mr Pye looked up swiftly His gaze darted to her hands, tre at her throat, and then shifted to the hills behind her
“I’m sorry, my lady I should have noticed your chill earlier” He turned back to the frightened gelding he was trying to liberate His hands must have been as numb as her own, but he labored steadily “There’s a shepherd’s cottage not far from here We can ride this horse and that one” He nodded at the horse next to the gelding “The other is lame”
“Really? How can you tell?” She hadn’t noticed the anie horses shivered and rolled their eyes at the whistling of the wind The horse he had indicated didn’t look any ed than the rest
“She’s favoring her right foreleg” Mr Pye grunted, and suddenly all three horses were free of the carriage, although they were still hitched together “Whoa, there, sweetheart” He caught the lead horse and stroked it, his tanned right handtenderly over the ani
She turned her head away to look at the hills Servants—and really a land steas just a superior sort of servant—should have no gender Of course, one knew they were people with their own lives and all that, but it s so much easier if one saw them as sexless Like a chair One wanted a chair to sit in when one was tired No one ever thought about chairs much otherwise, and that was how it should be How unco if the chair had noticed that one’s nose was running, wishing to knohat it was thinking, or seeing that the chair had rather beautiful eyes Not that chairs had eyes, beautiful or otherwise, but men did
And Harry Pye did
George faced hiain “What e do with the third horse?”
“We’ll have to leave her here”
“In the rain?”
“Yes”
“That can’t be good for her”
“No, ain, a reaction that George found oddly fascinating She wished she could make him do it more often
“Perhaps we should take her with us?”
“Impossible, my lady”
“Are you sure?”
The shoulders tensed and Mr Pye slowly turned his head In the flash of lightning that lit up the road in that instant, she saw his green eyes glea thunder crashed like the heralding of the apocalypse
George flinched
Harry Pye straightened
And the horses bolted
“OH, DEAR,” SAID LADY GEORGINA, rain dripping fro of a fix”
Soered Harry squinted up the road where the horses had disappeared, running as if the Devil hin of the daft beasts At the rate they’d been galloping, they wouldn’t stop for half aafter theaze to his eina’s aristocratic lips were blue, and the fur tri mess She looked hter of an earl
What was she doing here?
If not for Lady Georgina, he would’ve ridden a horse from London to her estates in Yorkshire He would’ve arrived a day ago at Woldsly Manor Right noould be enjoying a hothis baubles off, standing in thefast But on his last trip to London to report on her holdings, Lady Georgina had decided to travel with hie, now lying in a heap of broken wood in the ditch
Harry sed a sigh “Can you walk, my lady?”
Lady Georgina widened eyes that were as blue as a thrush’s egg “Oh, yes I’ve been doing it since I was eleven months old”
“Good” Harry shrugged on his waistcoat and coat, not bothering to button either They were soaked through like the rest of his froe Thankfully they were still dry He rolled thee lantern; then he gripped Lady Georgina’s elbow, just in case she rong and fell on her aristocratic little arse, and started trudging up the gorse-covered hill
At first, he’d thought her urge to travel to Yorkshire a childish fancy The lark of a woman who never worried where the meat on her table or the jewels at her throat came fro often had flighty ideas But the an to doubt that she was such a wos, true, but he’d seen almost at once that she did it for her own amusement She was s that Lady Georgina had a good reason for traveling with him to Yorkshire
“Is it , and her normally pale face sported two spots of red
Harry scanned the sodden hills, looking for a landainst an outcropping familiar? “Not far”
At least he hoped not It had been years since he’d last ridden these hills, and he ht have tumbled down since he last saw it
“I trust you are skilled at starting fires, Mr P-pye” His name chattered on her lips
She needed to get ware soon, he’d have to e robes “Oh, yes I’ve been doing it since I was four, my lady”
That earned hirin Their eyesinterrupted his half-forht, and he saw a stone wall in the flash
“There it is” Thank God
The tiny cottage still stood at least Four stone walls with a thatched roof black froe and the rain He put his shoulder to the slick door, and after one or two shoves, it gave Harry stuh to illuminate the interior Small shapes scurried into the shadows He checked a shudder
“Gah! It does sina walked in and waved her hand in front of her pink nose as if to shoo the stink of mildew
He banged the door closed behind her “I’m sorry, my lady”
“Why don’t you just tell lad I’m out of the rain?” She smiled and pulled back her hood
“I think not” Harry walked to the fireplace and found sos They were covered with cobwebs
“Oh, come, Mr Pye You know you wish t-t-to” Her teeth still chattered
Four rickety wooden chairs stood around a lopsided table Harry placed the lantern on the table and picked up a chair He swung it hard against the stone fireplace It shattered, the back co
Behind hiina squeaked
“No, I don’t, my lady,” he said
“Truly?”
“Yes” He knelt and began placing ss
“Very well I suppose I must be nice, then” Harry heard her draw up a chair “That looks very efficient, what you’re doing there”
He touched the lantern flaer pieces of the chair, careful not to smother the flame er One