Free Megan Frampton by Hero of My Heart Page B

momentarily gone as her eyes adjusted to the dimness.
    Now she was back to where she started: alone, nearly penniless, and untouched.
    Her future seemed as bleak as that of the man she was leaving behind her.

Chapter 8
    “Ah, Alasdair’s mystery lady.” Alasdair’s cousin stepped out of the darkness and stood so close she could smell his elegant odor of smoke, expensive alcohol, and fine cotton. “Done so soon?”
    He chuckled, then reached into his pocket pulled a few bills out, which he pressed into her unresisting hand. “For your trouble. Run along now, and don’t speak of this. Not that anyone would believe you.”
    It was clear from his dismissive tone that he thought Mary was just a lightskirt, a woman to be bought and paid for. And he wasn’t wrong, was he?
    Much as she would have loved to throw the bills back in his face, Mary pocketed the money and walked to the stairs. She couldn’t survive on her pride. She heard the door open, and then the sound of Alasdair’s cousin’s obnoxious tone again.
    She wished Alasdair were feeling well enough to pop his cousin in the nose.
    Although maybe Alasdair had done something terrible to disgrace the family, and his cousin had needed to hunt him down and return him. Maybe
that
explained his haste to go to Scotland.
    As she reached the last step, the doctor who’d accompanied Alasdair’s cousin trotted up the stairs, shoving her aside with one of his large, fleshy hands. He glared at her as he hustled up to the second floor.
    Mary didn’t trust him or Alasdair’s cousin. Not that she trusted Alasdair, either.
    Except he hadn’t hurt her. He’d promised not to hurt her, and he hadn’t.
    She felt a lump swell in her throat, and drew her cloak tighter around herself. She entered the common area of the inn, and walked up to the innkeeper.
    The man’s eyes widened when he saw her, then narrowed as he took in her disheveled appearance. “Look ’ere, you, I dinna care ’oo your lord be. I don’t care for that kind of thing in my establishment.”
    Mary snorted and leaned her elbow on the bar. “You did not seem to mind before my lord’s cousin arrived.”
    The innkeeper nodded his head in self-righteous indignation. “That’s cuz of how I dinna know your lord was mad.” He cast his eyes down her form, and Mary bristled.
    “He is not mad,” she said, and she meant it. He was all sorts of things, many of them nearly as bad, but he was not
mad
.
    And that she knew he was not mad made her itch to discover just what it was about him that was wrong—because
something
was horribly wrong, whether in his mind or in his body.
    But he’d told her to leave. She could head off to London with a clear conscience. Couldn’t she?
    She really was proving to be a good vicar’s daughter, wasn’t she?
    She sighed at what she was about to do. But she could not live with herself if she didn’t.
    “Where is the necessary?” she asked the innkeeper in an abrupt, commanding tone. He jerked his thumb toward the back and walked to the other end of the bar, obviously no longer considering her a worthwhile customer.
    Mary yanked her skirts up and walked quickly in the direction he’d pointed. As she’d hoped, the outbuilding was set off a little ways from the inn. She hunkered down onto her heels in the shadows of a large tree overhanging it and waited.
    Waited and yelled at herself. Why was she even bothering? It wasn’t as if he’d asked for help. He’d done the opposite, in fact. He’d refused it.
    And asked her to touch him, to assuage his agony. That part made her ache the most. What pain must he be in to need human touch to soothe it?
    She stopped arguing with herself when she heard a voice. A very familiar voice. Her insides turned to ice.
    “So she was here, then?” Matthias asked in a sharp, peremptory voice. “Trying to trick me by saying they were heading to London.” His voice was triumphant.
    The doctor replied. “Yes, but she’s gone now. My companion