“No!” She laughed up at him, her blue eyes crinkled at the corners, and suddenly his heart seemed to contract. Maybe he didn’t really care why she asked her questions—just so long as she asked them. “You’re teasing me now.”
“It’s true.” He felt his lips curve. “I’d reach right under the bird, feel its little downy body beating and warm on my fingers, and steal an egg straight from the nest it was sitting on.”
“Really?”
“A fact.”
“You’re probably bamming me again, Mr. Pye, but for some reason I believe you.” She shook her head. “But what did you do with the eggs after that? Eat them?”
“Eat them? Never!” He widened his eyes in an exaggeratedly horrified look that seemed to amuse her. That pleased him and he was puzzled. This silly conversation was like no other he could remember. Men took him dead seriously. Women were a little in awe of him. No one giggled at his words or attempted—
“Then what do you do with the eggs?” Her eyes were laughing up at him again.
He almost swore, he was so startled. Was Lady Georgina—an earl’s daughter for Christ’s sake—flirting with him?
He’d gone insane. “I’d take a pin and poke a tiny hole in each end of the egg and let it dry. I had a shelf next to my bed with a whole row of eggs, brown and white and clear blue. Blue as…” He trailed away. Blue as your eyes, he’d meant to say, but he remembered suddenly that this woman was his employer and he her servant. How could he forget that fact? Irritated with himself, he faced forward again.
She didn’t seem to notice his pause. “Do you have the eggs still? I’d like to see them.”
They’d rounded a bend in the road, and Harry saw that a tangle of branches blocked the way. A tree had fallen across the lane.
“Whoa!” He frowned. The lane was hardly wide enough for the gig as it was. It would be a devil’s job to turn the carriage around. What—?
Four men suddenly appeared from behind the tangled branches. They were big, they looked mean, and they each held a knife in their hand.
Shit.
Chapter Six
George screamed as Harry Pye made a heroic attempt to pull the horse around. The lane was too narrow, and the men were upon him in seconds. Mr. Pye kicked the first in the chest with a booted foot. The second and third overwhelmed and dragged him from the carriage. The fourth dealt him a horrendous blow to the jaw.
Oh, my sweet Lord! They were going to kill him. George felt a second scream clog her throat. The gig jolted as the horse half-reared. It was frightened and trying to run, stupid animal, even though it had nowhere to go. George frantically scrabbled for the reins on the floor of the gig, cursing under her breath and banging her head against the seat.
“Watch it! He’s got a knife!”
That wasn’t Mr. Pye’s voice. George chanced raising her head and saw to her relief that Harry Pye did indeed have a knife. He held a thin, gleaming blade in his left hand. Even from this distance it looked rather nasty. He was in a strangely graceful fighter’s crouch in the road, both hands in front of him. He appeared to know what he was doing, too. One of the villains was bleeding from his cheek. But the other three were circling, trying to flank him, and the odds didn’t look good.
The gig lurched again. She lost sight of the action as she fell and cracked her shoulder against the seat.
“Will you hold still, you silly beast?” she muttered.
The reins were sliding toward the front, and if she lost them, she’d never get control of the gig. Shouts and grunts came from the fighters, interspersed with the awful sound of fists hitting flesh. She daren’t risk looking up again. She held on to the seat with one hand to steady herself and strained with the other toward the slithering reins. Almost. Her fingertips grazed the leather, but the horse jolted, sending her back against the seat. She just kept her footing. If the horse would only hold still.
One.
More.
Second.
She dived and triumphantly came up with the reins. Quickly she sawed them, little minding the horse’s mouth, and tied them to the seat. She chanced a glance. Harry Pye was bleeding from his forehead. As she watched, an attacker lunged at him from his right. Mr. Pye whirled in a powerful move and kicked at the other man’s legs. A second thug clawed at his left arm. Mr. Pye twisted and performed some sort of maneuver, too fast for her to see. The man screamed and staggered back with a bloody hand. But the first man took advantage of the distraction. He hit Mr. Pye again and again in the middle. Harry Pye grunted with each blow, doubling over, valiantly trying to swing his knife.
George set the carriage brake.
The third and fourth men advanced. The first man punched Mr. Pye once more, and he fell to his knees, retching.
Mr. Pye was going to die.
Ohmygodohmygodohmygod! George scrambled under the seat and brought up a sackcloth-wrapped bundle. Shaking the cloth free, she clutched one of the dueling pistols in her right hand, raised it with a straight arm, aimed at the man standing over Mr. Pye, and fired.
Bang!
The explosion nearly deafened her. She squinted through the smoke and saw the man reel away, clutching his side. Got the bastard! She felt a thrill of bloodthirsty glee. The remaining men, including Harry Pye, had turned in her direction with varying degrees of shock and horror. She raised the second pistol and took aim at another man.
The man flinched and ducked. “Gorblimey! She’s got a pistol!”
Apparently the thought that she might be dangerous had never crossed their minds.
Harry Pye rose, pivoted silently, and slashed at the man nearest him.
“Jaysus!” the man screamed, holding a hand to his bloody face. “Let’s go, lads!” The thugs turned and dashed back the way they’d come.
The lane was suddenly quiet.
George heard the blood rushing in her veins. She carefully set the pistols down on the seat.
Mr. Pye still looked in the direction the men had disappeared. He seemed to decide that they were gone, for he lowered the hand holding the knife. Bending, he slipped it inside his boot. Then he turned to her. The blood from the wound on his forehead had mixed with sweat and smeared down the side of his face. Stray hairs from his queue stuck to the gore. He breathed deeply, his nostrils flaring as he tried to catch his breath.
George felt strange, almost angry.
He walked toward her, his boots scraping against the rocks in the road. “Why didn’t you tell me you’d brought pistols?” His voice was raspy and deep. It demanded apology, concession, even submission.