“There won’t be a sane or sober hack driver on the street in this weather,” he warned.
“Which is just as well, as I planned to walk.”
“I see. To... where, precisely?” He languidly swept an arm to indicate the black night laced by labyrinths of alleys. Here and there, blurry pinpricks of light interrupted the dark. Lamps thatwould soon be snuffed either by their owners or by the relentlessly building wind. When the storm broke in earnest, not even the watch would be out on the streets.
The woman took a breath and drew herself up to her full height. The top of her head had reached about to his collarbone, and she smelled of good soap. He’d noted this when he’d held her. “Sir, I’ve nothing worth taking in any sense of the word. If you do not plan to rob or—or—otherwise—me, I’ll just be on my way. But I am grateful for the assistance and I hope no lasting damage was done to your person by its collision with mine. Goodbye. I’ll... think of you fondly from time to time.”
It was just the sort of bracingly acerbic speech Lorcan appreciated.
She sounded more exasperated than fearful. Given where she was and what she was doing, she ought to be both. A sane woman would be, anyhow.
When he said nothing, she snatched up her bag and began walking.
She rounded the corner out of the alley and continued walking at a brisk clip, the heels of good walking shoes echoing in the dark, her bulging valise thumping against her thigh. Increasingly fat raindrops bashed down on the top of her hat and bounced off, glinting. She was soon barely visible in the misty wash of darkness and weather.
He had the strangest sense that he was watching someone wade suicidally into the ocean.
“Christ,” he muttered. Irritated.
He couldn’t allow it.
He followed, quietly. Stealthily. At a distance.
She made what appeared to be a decisive turn around a corner toward Lovell Street.
Seconds later, he heard the scream.
Daphne flung her body back against the building wall.
A knife was pointed at her throat and a mouth was open in a dark snarl inches from her eyes. “I’ll just take yer baggage, now, won’t I—”
Something darted out in her peripheral vision.
Her attacker howled in pain as the knife flew from his hand.
She heard it slice the air in cartwheels and land with a metallicclink.
Her rescuer seized a fistful of the attacker’s coat in one fist and hoisted him until his boot toes scraped the cobblestones.
“ARE. YOU. MAD.” Three vicious slaps whipped the would-be thief’s head to and fro. Three words were delivered like barked orders.
The shocking sound of flesh striking flesh cramped Daphne’s stomach.
“God have mercy...” Her attacker moaned. “Lordship? I didna know you were back in London—I didna know she was yer doxie, Lordship—dinna kill me—God save me—”
Lordship?
“Cease your whining. Preying on a wee woman alone,” he hissed. “I should slit you like a fish. Go on. Get out of here.”
He opened his hand as though dumping a chamber pot. The man dropped to his knees witha gut-churning crack. He crawled a few inches, then righted himself, and half scrambled, half stumbled away. His footfalls echoed, then faded, then were gone.
Her large rescuer didn’t precisely brush his hands briskly together. But he seemed no more nonplussed than if he’d just taken a broom to a dusty cottage floor.
They regarded each other in silence for a moment.
“I’m sorry you were obliged to experience that,” he said finally.
But she couldn’t speak. The efficient, competent brutality of it had bludgeoned her witless.