He leaned forward, took her chin in his hand. “No, my sweet, we’re in this together. We will not give in to this evil bastard.” He sat so close to her that she could see the stubble shading his chin despite his shave that morning. “No running away.” He studied her with a gaze altogether too perceptive for her liking. “Or should I say no running away again?”

She flinched back but he maintained his touch on her chin, although he didn’t grip her hard enough to bruise. “Yes.” She swept her tongue across her lips and his eyes darkened, almost imperceptibly. Because they remained so close, she saw everything.

As he would in her. “You’re right. That’s why I ran.”

“Talk to me.” He released her, but didn’t move back.

“They used to be camp followers. The kind who set up gambling dens to amuse the soldiers and then entrap them.”

“Is that what they did?” His words rapped out, harsh and unforgiving.

She swallowed, nodded. “John, that is my husband—“

“Your first husband.”

She was in no mood to contradict him, this husband who was not. He deserved the truth. “Well he spent time in their tent and came out not only a pauper, but in serious debt. Serious for us, anyway. Five hundred pounds.” It sounded trivial now she had such wealth.

“That’s not all, is it?”

She shook her head slightly, kept his gaze although she was finding the task increasingly difficult.

A short respite followed because after a soft knock and his

“Come,” two maids entered the room with tea and fresh toast. How did they know she turned to toast when she wanted a little something in the afternoon? She’d never confessed her small sin to anyone. Either that or muffins, but the muffin-man might not come this far west. Her mind skittered off into the everyday, but she had a problem with that. She didn’t have an everyday any longer, no comfortable routine to follow.

He didn’t speak of the incidents at the Exchange that day until he’d poured her tea himself, dismissed the servants and brought her the cup himself. A delicate china cup with sprays of flowers, the kind she’d have kept for best. Her mother would have loved a set like this. Faith took a grateful sip, then another. Fresh tea was a pleasure she’d never denied herself.

When she’d drunk it, he took the cup from her and put it aside.

“Better?”

She nodded, feeling steadier.

“Then let’s resume.” He sat on the bed once more, almost as close as he’d been before. “Your first husband owed these people a debt. Is that right?”

“Yes.”

“You know that five hundred pounds is not a problem for us.

You could pay that with the pin money I intend to give you.”

She loved the “Us,” wished it was real. “Yes, but with the interest—“

“You can forget the interest. If your husband owed a debt of honour, even to a villain, that’s one thing, but I will not pay money gained from extortionate interest rates. Will you leave the matter to me?”

Terror clutched her, but for him, not herself. “He’ll kill you.”

John snorted. “He’s welcome to try.”

Never had he appeared as much a warrior than he did at this moment. What could he see? The truth? It seemed so because his next words showed his perception. “There’s more, isn’t there? Five hundred pounds wouldn’t send you into this state. You’re terrified and I’ve seen your courage in other situations first hand. This is nothing as trivial as money. What did he do?”

He refused to let her go until she’d told him, shown him how impossible it was for her to stay. “John put something else up as a stake. Me.”

Warriors tried not to grow angry because it affected their ability to fight, but John was furious. His eyes glowed with it, his mouth tightened. “Did you do anything? Did they force you to do anything?”

“They had no time.”

“That’s no answer. Try again.”

“It’s the truth. Cockfosters said he would. After they’d come to tell me that John was dead, he arrived and informed me the debt stood and I should ready myself to go with him. He said he had a place for me.” Now she’d started talking, she couldn’t stop. She’d kept this to herself for two years, unable to trust anyone, and it poured out of her. “He said he’d take me to a house in London and I’d work on my back for my keep. I belonged to him, I was his property. He still sees me as such.”

“I’m sure he does. You know there’s no basis in law for any of this, don’t you?”

“I had nobody. If I’d gone back to the vicarage they would not have welcomed me, and if Cockfosters had found out where I was, he’d have punished them, too.” She paused. “Yes, of course I knew.

But I had no money, no means, and nobody to care for me.”

His anger dissipated, replaced by something that looked like—relief? Surely not. “He calls himself Cockfosters, does he? Is that where he lives?”

“I have no idea. It’s the only name I know for him.”

He caught her hands in his, his warmth seeping through her, heating her from the inside out. “So you ran, and took another name?”

She bit her lip, forced back the fresh wellspring of tears. “I couldn’t think of anything else to do. I used the last of my money to buy a decent mourning outfit and passage to Dover. If the army had brought me, it would have been as Mrs. Smith, but I went to the Admiralty as Mrs. Dalkington-Smythe. I’m so sorry. I know I shouldn’t have done it, but I could think of no other way around the problem.” Thankfully, he let her talk. “It was an official who gave me the notion. After the battle they were mustering widows, and he called out your name, but nobody came forward, so I thought—what if someone did? Too many people knew me there for me to lay claim, so I packed and left that night, went somewhere nobody knew me.”

“Does your companion?”

“Amelia? No. She’s your relative, not mine. When I arrived in London, the dowager visited me and she suggested Amelia and said I could not live on my own in town. I liked London, the way I could live quietly and people wouldn’t take a great deal of notice of me, so I took her up on her offer. I was merely another war widow. As far as I knew you were dead, and I was taking money from no one. I told myself that, at any rate.”

He squeezed her hands. “Instead, I was very much alive and trying to forget what had happened to me. I must have come as a great shock to you.”

“A welcome one.” Her eyes widened. “I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have said that. I have no right—“

He touched her lips. “You have every right. We keep to our story. Cockfosters will no longer be a problem for you.”

“He won’t stop. If he doesn’t use me that way, he’ll find another.

He knows, John, and he’ll inform on us. I saw what he did to women when their men got into trouble. It wasn’t John’s fault. He wasn’t a contemplative man, and he never gave a great deal of thought to the consequences of his actions.”

“Which made him a good soldier but a poor officer. That and his lack of imagination. He followed orders. It mitigated against him in the long run, didn’t it?” His mouth gained a bitter twist.

“And you.” He closed his eyes briefly, sucked in a breath. When he looked at her again, his eyes were blazing. “I let you down. Let one of my men down. I grew so caught up trying to do the honourable thing and ignore you that I ignored the threat to you, too.” He drew her closer, pressed a kiss to her lips as if he couldn’t help himself.

“I’ll never do that again, I promise.”

Breathless from the sudden embrace, she felt a weight leave her.

No longer alone. She hadn’t realised the burden she’d shouldered.

Even with her husband she’d managed the practical aspects of their lives.

Guilt still burdened her. What could she possibly give him in return? Nothing but her loyalty, and total support. She didn’t know if she could give him a child and at twenty-eight, she was surely old to start a family. Her mother had shelled children like peas, one a year until they’d mysteriously stopped coming. Whether she’d discovered a preventative or they’d ceased having relations she didn’t know but the thought of giving up what she’d so recently discovered with John, this John, appalled her.

“It’s not your fault.”

He gathered her up, held her for a precious moment. “Neither is it yours. I’ll find him, pay him and that will be an end of it. If you ever see him again, or suspect you do, I’ll kill him. I’ve killed enough good men during wartime not to mourn the loss of a thoroughly bad one.”

She was about to tell him he must not do any such thing, but his last remark made a kind of sense. No doubt Cockfosters would find his end on the gallows, because few villains lived to old age, but she couldn’t think of one reason to deter John from his purpose.

He laid her down and covered her, his hands gentle. “Thank you for telling me. Now rest. I’ll have dinner sent up for you tonight.

Nobody will expect you to dress today after the shock you had. A nasty fall can shake a person.” He paused, smiled. “Sleep well. Be assured that if I stayed, you would get little rest.”

Although she didn’t think she would sleep, within ten minutes she had sunk into exhausted slumber.

* * *

John strode downstairs to the main rooms with a new sense of purpose and unexpected happiness in his heart. Faith would be surprised to hear that, but he wouldn’t deny it. She hadn’t taken advantage of him because the opportunity presented itself, she’d done it to escape an untenable situation. While he’d understood the need to stay out of poverty, the absolute requirement to avoid a man who would have put her into sexual slavery. He’d seen the bastard, and he had no doubt of the veracity of what he said. The villain wouldn’t have turned a hair.

She’d had no one to care for her, no one to miss her, should Cockfosters have taken her away to one of those miserable houses where women never dressed and lived on their backs, servicing so many men they lost count. Before dying of exhaustion, the drugs fed them to rid them of unwanted pregnancies, or disease. Or simply killed themselves from sheer despair.

The Faith he knew wouldn’t have given in. But she had nobody to rescue her. She’d had to do it for herself.

He’d tried to deter his men from visiting such establishments.

But he couldn’t fuss over them like a nurse, and as long as they retained their ability to fight, he couldn’t punish them. Likely this Cockfosters bastard had been the type who’d stripped him after the battle and left him naked to die. He’d have killed the man today, had he not had more concern for Faith and her distress. He promised himself that he’d hunt down the bully and his cohorts.

They wouldn’t put another woman into slavery, nor would they terrify anyone else.

The expression on her face haunted him. He never wanted to see it again, the helpless, desperate look.

He paused, his hand on his study door. A footman hurried forward, but he waved him away. He wasn’t naturally chivalrous, whatever Faith might think. His soldiering had come from a different part of his nature, the restless part, not the desire to see wrongs put right and the helpless protected. All too often the helpless turned on their rescuers, if the rescuer was naïve enough to expect thanks. These urges to care for Faith, to ensure her happiness came as new to him. Not for years had he felt that way, and why now still escaped his understanding. He couldn’t put it down to the desire he felt for her, which was, admittedly, explosive.

Tempting to put it down to finding an unexpected ally in this new world, but he was wondering if it was something else entirely. He shied away from that conclusion.

If he went after Cockfosters now, he’d go in anger, with the emotions of a man determined to avenge those he—there came that word again. No, better to give himself time to calm down, to work out a proper scheme. Cockfosters would have gone to ground in places even John couldn’t reach him. Give him breathing space, let him feel safe. Then strike.

He turned the handle and went in to his study, determining to lose himself in facts and figures for the next hour. They never confused him, or asked more of him than he wanted to give. A good soldier kept his head and coolly assessed the situation at all times, moving on when the odds were with him, not against him. A competent businessman did the same. A competent earl? He had no idea.

He crossed to the sideboard and poured himself a snifter of brandy. He carried it over to the desk, thankfully a substantial one, not one of those spindly things the dowager preferred that looked as if they’d collapse in a light breeze. He’d had some of his ledgers brought here and as he opened the first one he took a deep, appreciative breath of the familiar.