Page 12 of Captured By the Werewolf Highwaymen

“I’ll take you there.”

She murmured a protest.

Gideon rose from his seat, frowning as he looked between Desmond’s hand on her elbow and her own worried face. “Mrs. Ballantine?”

“I…” She straightened, though his concern touched her. “I’m alright.”

Gideon gave a small nod before slowly lowering himself back down into the chair. “Call out if you require assistance.”

“She won’t need it.” Desmond led her into the corridor. He paused, and glanced up and down the hallway. “Which way is your bedchamber?”

Those words on his lips sent a thrill of fear through her. Fear and…heat. Followed by a quick throb of shame.

“It’s over there.” She indicated the direction with a tilt of her chin. “Last door on the left.”

Wordlessly, he escorted her to her bedroom. It wasn’t a long walk, for though the house was far too large for one person, by manor house standards, it was relatively modest, boasting only seven bedchambers, not including where the servants would have slept. All the same, she felt the strain of silence between them as they progressed down the corridor.

“Never been in a house like this before,” he said.

She lifted her brows, but then, it oughtn’t come as a surprise that he’d have no familiarity with a manor.

“How many people live here?” he asked.

“At present, only one. But it’s supposed to house a family.” The words felt cold in her mouth.

“A big family, I reckon.” He glanced at the doors lining the hallway, each leading to different bedchambers.

“Gentry like to have enough children to ensure they have a male heir, and at least one more boy child, in case something happens to the first.”

“A chilly way to think of children,” he muttered.

“Usually, the only thing aristocratic families lack is sentiment.”

At last, they reached her room. The door was open, and she hesitated outside.

“Go on,” he urged.

She stepped across the threshold. Her stomach clenched when he followed and shut the door behind them. She turned to see him crouching down in front of the fire, stirring it back to life. When flames began to rise once more, he stood and faced her.

By God, he was large.

Her bedchamber hadn’t seen a man inside it for seven years. Arthur had been dead for six of those, and the year before that, well, he seldom joined her in this room. When he had, his visits hadn’t lasted very long.

Arthur had been a sportsman who enjoyed riding and hunting, and he had possessed a trim muscularity that Clara had once considered to be the apex of masculine form. Yet having Desmond Marsh in this rather small room, with its dainty furniture and stacks of books, she realized that there were many ways of being a man, and clearly, Desmond had claimed one of them all for himself.

He strode around the room, peering at the framed pictures of local wildflowers, then lingered a moment at her dressing table. There were no bottles of toilet water or scent or pots of rouge, only a hand mirror, a brush, and a chipped basin and ewer. His fingers lingered over the boar bristles of her brush, and a flush of awareness coursed through her, to have him feel the object she ran through her hair every morning and night.

He moved on from her dressing table, and bent down to examine the stack of books she’d laid beside her bed. She blushed again—something that happened all too readily when he was nearby—when he picked up one of the volumes.

“What’s this say?” He pointed to the spine of the book.

Reluctantly, she stepped closer and looked.

“Folklore of Ancient Britain,” she murmured.

He pointed to another book. “And that one?”

She didn’t have to glance at the spine to know its title. “Tales of Magic and Enchantment for Inquisitive Readers.”