“Stomachache,” he said hoarsely. “Must have eaten too fast.”
Lord Dalrymple appeared alongside his daughter. “Alexander? Is something wrong?”
“I’m fine.” He managed a weak smile. “You two explore the tunnel. I’ll just, uh, go upstairs and sit down for a bit.”
Lord Dalrymple peered at him more closely. “You look quite ill, you know.”
“Indigestion,” Alexander said. “It’ll pass.” He waved them towards the cellar. “Explore the tunnel. Go.”
A babble of voices rose in the cellar. The landlord and tapster had returned, breathless, talking over one another in their excitement.
“A hundred yards long—”
“Lined with bricks the whole way—”
“Perfectly dry—”
“Doesn’t come out in the cove at all—”
“No wonder we could never find the other end—”
“You have to come see it!”
Georgiana glanced at the cellar, longing clear to read on her face.
“Go,” Alexander repeated firmly. “I’m perfectly all right.”
Georgiana hesitated, and then did as he bid, stepping back into the cellar, looking at him over her shoulder, eager and worried at the same time.
Lord Dalrymple followed. Don’t let her in the tunnel, Alexander wanted to shout. He bit his tongue to hold the words back, clenched the candle more tightly in his fist—and realized that the flame had extinguished itself.
Terror paralyzed him. Faint light leaked through the doorway, but other than that he was surrounded by darkness. He couldn’t move, couldn’t breathe, couldn’t blink, could only stand frozen, dying with sheer terror.
A brief burst of excited laughter came from the old cellar. “Hurry up,” a boy’s voice said urgently. “I wanna see.”
Alexander’s paralysis broke. He groped his way hastily to the door. Only two people were left in the cellar: a serving maid with a lantern, and the scullery boy. As he watched, the serving maid stepped into the tunnel. Crowding eagerly on her heels was the scullery boy.
When the servants vanished into that dark, gaping mouth, so, too, did the last of the lantern light.
The next minute was the most awful one of Alexander’s adult life. Somehow he made his way back to the scullery stairs, stumbling blindly, a soundless scream in his chest. He climbed the stairs frantically and fell to hands and knees on the scullery floor, shaking, wheezing, bile burning in his throat.
Fuck, fuck, fuck.
He squeezed his eyes shut and pressed his forehead to the cold flagstones, and tried to catch his breath, almost sobbing.
It took nearly ten minutes for his jerky, gasping breathing to calm down to something slow and regular. Alexander lifted his head and looked around. There was no one in the scullery, no one in the kitchen, and that was the only good thing that had happened to him in the last forty-eight hours: that no one had witnessed his disintegration.
It was in that moment, kneeling on the floor, that he knew he couldn’t marry Georgiana. It had nothing to do with whether he was a duke’s son or a farmer’s son. It had to do with him. With this. With the fact that he was twenty-nine years old and yet his fear of the dark still conquered him.
If Georgiana could see him right now, if Lord Dalrymple could see him . . .
It was easy to imagine their pity.
Alexander wiped his face. His hands were still shaking slightly. His hair, when he touched it, was almost sodden with sweat. So was his neckcloth. He climbed to his feet stiffly, wearily, and emerged from the scullery, crossed the kitchen, and opened the door to the corridor. The corridor was thick with shadows, dimly lit, but not so dimly lit that he couldn’t force himself to step into it.
He walked with the slow gait of an old man. Everything inside him ached—his limbs, his joints, his head, his heart. He couldn’t remember the last time he’d cried, but he was close to crying right now.
The corridor branched. He had a choice: upstairs to his bedchamber, where his valet waited; to the private parlor, where Georgiana and Lord Dalrymple would almost certainly return; or to the noisy taproom.
He didn’t feel up to any of those options. There was no way he could face Georgiana or her father again tonight. Even Fletcher’s quiet professionalism was too much right now.
Alexander leaned his head back against the wall and closed his eyes and wished that everything was different, that he was different, that he wasn’t ruled by his childhood terror of the dark.
If wishes were horses, beggars would ride.
He heard the muted din from the taproom, and beneath that, barely audible, a woman’s voice. “No. Let me go.” The words were low and choked. “Please.”
Alexander’s eyes snapped open. He pushed away from the wall and headed in the direction of that faint voice.
He found the voice’s owner half-hidden in the shadows. Or rather, he found two people. One was a man, the other a serving maid. The maid was a tiny thing. She looked barely fifteen years old. The man was a hulking brute wearing a laborer’s rough clothing. Alexander couldn’t see his face—the man’s back was to him—but he could see the serving maid’s face, could see her desperation, her terror.
Alexander reached out and tapped the man on the shoulder. He had to tap quite forcefully to get his attention. After several seconds the man turned his head. “Wha’?”
Alexander punched him hard, full in the face.
The man released the serving maid, staggered against the wall, then caught his balance and surged at Alexander, fists upraised.
Alexander punched him again, even harder.
The man’s head snapped back. He staggered into the wall again. This time he didn’t catch his balance; his legs buckled and he slid to the floor.
Alexander stepped closer and sank into a crouch. The man’s smell came to him: sweat, ale, blood.
Slowly those bleary eyes focused on him. When Alexander was certain he had the man’s attention, he said, “She asked you to let her go.”
“Fuck orf,” the man said. He spat, a mix of blood and saliva that landed on the flagstones.
Alexander ignored it. “No means no,” he said. “No always means no. Do you understand that, or do I need to beat it into you?”
This time the man stayed silent.
Alexander stood. He grabbed the man by the scruff of his neck, hauled him to his feet, and dragged him along the corridor, past the door to the taproom, past the private parlor, to the inn’s main entrance, with its thick oak door.
Alexander opened the door and shoved the man outside. “Get out. You’re not welcome here.”
The man staggered several steps, caught his balance, and turned, his fists balling. Alexander balled his own fists and felt a fierce surge of exhilaration.
There was a taut moment of expectancy, and then the man spat and turned away.
Alexander lowered his fists and watched him out of sight, disappointed. He wasn’t a brawler, but right at this moment he wanted to fight. He wanted blood. He wanted violence. He wanted victory.
He closed the door, and turned to find the serving maid standing behind him, sobbing into her apron.
His belligerence extinguished instantly. “It’s all right,” Alexander said, and steered her to the settle by the door.