The Art of Taming a Rake (Legendary Lovers 4)

rd to sustain his former grim determination. Particularly when he was aware of a bitter irony:

If he’d harbored any doubt about his love for Venetia, his visceral response to her abduction would have settled the question. Why only now, when it might be too late, had he come to realize how precious she was to him?

“Where are you taking me?” Venetia asked as the compte’s coach rumbled over Westminster Bridge.

“You will learn soon enough.”

After crossing the Thames River and traveling another mile or so, she realized their environs were becoming less inhabited. Venetia shivered, unable to control the chills snaking down her spine. Even though she had left clues as to her captor, they were heading beyond the city, where no one would know how to find her.

Yet she couldn’t just sit here cowering. Instead, she needed to persuade Montreux to disclose any information she might use to her benefit.

She began by appealing to his vanity, giving him a compliment. “I must commend you on your cleverness, monsieur. You managed to abduct me with very little effort.”

Her opening gambit was met by dispiriting silence.

“I played directly into your hands, didn’t I? By leaving my home to visit my sister¸ I made your task much easier.”

The compte’s faint smile made her skin crawl. “You obliged me, yes. Otherwise I would have needed to seize you from your house, and leading you out at gunpoint would have been quite difficult.”

“You must have known Traherne was away.”

“Certainly I did. I pride myself with my acumen. You were the more vulnerable target.” Montreux made a scoffing sound. “Did he think I wouldn’t deduce his ploy to draw me out? It was much too obvious. I sent my hirelings to divert Traherne while I put my plan in motion. And soon enough I will—what is the English phrase?—turn the tables upon him.”

Fresh fear swamped Venetia at the reminder that he planned to lure Quinn to his death.

Before she could reply, Montreux cut her off. “Now hold your tongue, madame. I have no desire to listen to your babble.”

He returned his pistol to the case lying on the seat beside him, which Venetia recognized as a dueling set. Clearly he had great confidence that she was helpless—which indeed she was at the moment. As the coach picked up speed, she had no choice but to obey his command.

They drove for another half hour at least. Venetia alternated between hope and dread that Quinn would somehow divine her location and come after her, for a rescue attempt could prove fatal for him.

By now the road had narrowed to a rural lane. They were in farming country, where houses and cottages were more sparse. Dusk was falling by the time the coach turned onto a badly rutted lane.

When eventually they halted and Montreux handed her down, Venetia took careful note of her surroundings. It appeared to be a farm. Before her stood a two-story, timber-framed cottage, with woods on one side, barns and outbuildings on the other. Perhaps lodging for a tenant farmer and his family.

“I regret the poor accommodations,” Montreux said as he took her elbow and led her toward the cottage. “No doubt it is not what you are accustomed to. This was all I could afford when I had to flee France. Fortunately, I recouped many of my lands and possessions, so that I now have significant wealth.”

Behind her, a second carriage rolled to a halt and dislodged the henchman called Armand, along with several other grim-faced men. Montreux shook Venetia’s arm to prevent her looking over her shoulder, then ushered her inside, where a lamp lit the small entry hall.

“Your room is on the floor above,” he said, gesturing at the narrow staircase. “Dinner will be brought to you in a short while, naturellement. I am not a savage. I will treat a comptesse with the courtesy she deserves.”

Venetia quelled a retort. Of course he was a savage, but it would be the height of stupidity to challenge him and let him think her other than a spineless captive.

From his coat pocket Montreux pulled out his fob watch and checked the time. “I expect by now your husband has learned of your disappearance. In the morning I will send a message to Traherne. For now I will permit him to, how do you say it, stew? He will be frantic once he learns of his missing wife.”

Unable to imagine Quinn becoming frantic over anything, Venetia again bit her tongue. Somehow she would have to manufacture her own rescue before Montreux had the chance to murder Quinn, but for now she would pretend to go along with her imprisonment.

She was taken by Armand to a bedchamber on the second floor and locked inside. When after a few moments she tried the handle, the door wouldn’t budge, but at least she was able to open the window.

Her room faced the rear of the house, she saw in the fading light. There was a vegetable garden below, enclosed by a wall with an iron gate at the rear. If she could manage to climb over the wall, she would seek aid at a neighboring farmhouse. She had to escape, but how?

She waited until full dark, pacing the floor, trying to think of her best course of action. After a quarter hour, she got to work, tearing strips from a bedsheet and knotting them together to make a rope.

Nearly another hour passed—time she spent fretting—before a man delivered a supper tray. He found Venetia sitting meekly in a chair. But as soon as the door closed behind him and the key turned in the lock, she jumped up and began her escape attempt. Now would be the best time to flee, while Montreux and his cohorts were occupied with their own supper.

She secured one end of her sheet rope around the bedpost, then fished the other end out the window. Thankfully, it was long enough to reach the ground.

Now for the difficult part. The drop was only a short distance—perhaps some twenty feet—but she had to complete her feat in silence to avoid alerting her captors. In the hush of the garden, every sound seemed amplified. And the glow of light coming from a window below her would make her more visible as well.