Page 10 of Outrageous

She looked up, having forgotten she wasn’t alone.

“What are you thinking?” she countered.

He grinned. “I’m thinking that you might actually be more lovely dressed in snug breeches and that formfitting coat than you are in a ball gown.” He leaned forward and Eva recoiled. “I’m thinking I’d love to see what your arse looks like in those tight leathers.”

Eva gasped and heat crept up her neck, her body’s treachery making her hate her appearance more than ever. Eva knew what he said was true: she was beautiful. Only a fool would try to deny it. All her life she’d hated what she saw in the mirror, not to mention the expectations that went with her appearance. Nobody would ever believe her—not that she cared—but she wished with all her heart that she was a big, lumbering, homely girl—like one of the kitchen maids at her father’s castle, a girl named Em who had hair and eyes the color of mud—a girl she’d seen laughing and jesting with her father’s grooms as if she were one of them. Everyone liked Em because of who she was—not because she looked like some sort of vapid, porcelain doll.

That was who Eva wanted to be.

The only man who’d ever ignored the way Eva looked was James. And there was a good reason for that, not that she’d ever tell. James had always behaved toward her the way he would with a younger son of the family: with respect but not with worshipful awe as other boys had always done. At least until they knew who she was; after that they looked at her with loathing and fear.

She loved James and respected him in return. She also wished she were like him. In fact, in her mind’s eye she was like him: big and brawny and strapping. But in reality she was small, slight, dainty: the very image of her beautiful, mad, dead mother.

Thinking of her mother made her scowl. She looked at the man who’d made her remember the long dead Countess of Exley and fixed him with a narrow-eyed glare.

“You even look adorable when you scowl.” His eyes wandered slowly from the toes of her boots, over her legs and torso, lingering on her face before settling on her unruly hair. “You can clothe your sweet little body in breeches and boots, but I’m afraid only a blind person would ever believe you are a man, darling.”

She sucked in a breath at the shocking words sweet and little and body and darling, her heart thudding like a war drum in her chest, and her skin hot—all over.

He chuckled at whatever he saw on her face.

Hateful, hateful man. “You asked me what I was thinking, my lord earl?”

“Mmmm?”

“I’m thinking you’d better shut up or I’ll gag you.”

He patted the seat beside him. “You’ll need two hands for that. Come on over here, sweetheart. I’ll hold your pistol while you do it.”

Eva was considering shooting him when the door opened a crack and James handed in another clay jug and a large oil-cloth wrapped package. “It’s sandwiches and homebrew, my lady.”

“Hand it to Lord Visel.” She gave the smirking lord a tight smile. “He can put it to good use and stuff it in his mouth.”

* * *

Godric hadn’t thought he was starving until after the first bite. The sandwich wasn’t anything special, just good dark bread with a slab of ham and a thick slice of Lincolnshire Red. The jug held a rich, sweet porter that soothed his aching head. By the time they were about an hour away from the posting inn, he was feeling almost human. With some very human needs.

“I need to use the necessary.” The words sounded unnaturally loud in the post chaise, which had been utterly silent since rolling out of the innyard. Her full lips tightened and a fetching flush tinted her cheeks. So, the little hoyden had a vulgar mouth but she was not entirely cast away.

“I should hate for things to become unpleasant,” he said when she continued to stare. “Well, any more unpleasant.”

She huffed out a sigh and knocked on the roof with the hand not holding the pistol. The panel behind Visel’s head slid open immediately.

“His lordship needs to make a stop.”

“Here, my lady?” It was the voice of her earnest young henchman, a man who looked as if he desperately wished he’d told his mistress no back when he’d had the chance.

“Sooner rather than later, James.”

“Er, yes, very good, my lady.”

Godric and the girl glared at each other in silence as the carriage slowed a bit. He imagined the postilions were looking for a place a four-horse team could pull off the road.

“I can tell you are thinking you will escape, Lord Visel.”

He looked from the window to her, unsurprised by her words. She was young but she was not silly. Of course she was also barking mad, but that seemed to add a low cunning to her thought processes.

Godric cocked his head. “Lady Eva, you have taken my money and we are on a stretch of road with nothing for miles in any direction. What would I do out here on my own?”