“I’ll follow you to hospital.” Cecelia clutched his hand.
“No need. I’ve had enough bruised or broken ribs in my day to know what they feel like,” he said. “They’ll patch me up, set my shoulder, and send me home with the most wonderful morphine.”
“We’re coming to hospital, old man,” Francesca declared, her stubbornness doing little to conceal the hard-won fondness softening her gaze. “You’re too wounded to fight us on this.”
“A herd of stampeding rhinoceroses wouldn’t keep us away,” Alexandra chimed in, smoothing his hair with cautious gentility.
“The three of ye are going exactly nowhere,” growled a most unwelcome voice.
Cecelia’s mouth turned to ash when she looked up to see Ramsay storming into the gardens like an advancing general. With his features drawn into a furious mask of wrath, she had to fight a very primal instinct to flee such a masculine, mercenary onslaught.
It was a wonder that nations didn’t fall before him, with a countenance that fierce. That rivers didn’t divert at his word and mountains shouldn’t move to make way for his march.
Genny had been right: It was easy to forget how astonishingly large he was until one was faced with two-hundred-plus pounds of Scots muscle and icy wrath charging forward like a golden bull. Head low. Nostrils flaring. Untouched by the chaos and destruction around him.
Untouchable.
Cecelia was surprised to find that she rather disliked the idea of him trailing his disgust and self-righteousness all over her establishment.
Indeed. Whether she liked it or not, it was hers. She owned it.
And she would now be forced to own up to it.
There would be no seducing secrets from the Vicar of Vice. Not now that he was about to find out just who exactly she was.
Her tongue felt like sandpaper as Ramsay planted his boots a few feet away from them, his gaze making a trail of blue fire up and down Cecelia’s filthy frame.
“First of all, is anyone wounded?” he snarled.
“Other than the Frenchman on the stretcher and nine others being hefted into ambulances?” Francesca retorted, folding her arms.
“The wounded on the lawn are being seen to. My question is directed at ye ladies.” The word dripped from him with acerbic sarcasm as he adopted the exact same posture.
Cecelia noted how his suitcoat stretched over the bulk of his shoulders, straining at the seams. It seemed he could flex but once and the entire thing, though very well made, would be forced to give way.
What a strange thing to notice at a time like this.
She put a hand to her forehead. Perhaps she was concussed.
“We’re unharmed, thank you, Ramsay.” Alexandra answered her brother-in-law’s query when it became apparent no one else was about to.
“Does my brother know ye’re here, Yer Grace?” The last syllable slithered from between his teeth like a hiss.
“Of course he does,” Alexandra replied. “Which is why I expect him to burst through the doors any moment wild and disheveled and terrified for me.” Alexandra’s bravado had begun to fade, her bright brunette eyes now pinching with strain. “I should like him to hurry.”
Cecelia wrapped her arm around Alexandra’s waist to offer what comfort she could until her husband arrived.
What would it be like to have someone care and worry for her as Redmayne did for his wife? With all of himself. The duke would have thrown his own body over his duchess in a blast such as this. He’d have carried her to safety on two broken legs. He’d have bled out before allowing harm to come to her.
Cecelia didn’t want to feel sorry for herself, but with Jean-Yves so frighteningly injured and a new charge to look after, she felt heavier than she ever had both physically and otherwise. Weighted down with unknown secrets and unidentified enemies, the blood of four innocent souls, the innocence of missing girls, and the safety of everyone now in her care and employ.
Ramsay blinked at Alexandra, disbelief etched into the hard frown lines bracketing his mouth. “Ye mean for me to believe Redmayne allows ye to come to this place?” He gestured to the rubble.
“Redmayne allows me nothing. I am my own person and ask permission of no one.” Alexandra slid her gaze to Cecelia. “However, I was touring the school to see if I wanted to add it to my more philanthropic endeavors. As it turns out, I categorically do. Especially now.”
Cecelia would have expressed her undying gratitude to Alexandra had she not been interrupted by the explosive din of an enormous burning beam of wood, which chose that moment to roll down the mountain of rubble toward them.
In a manner that very much remind her of a charging bull, Ramsay lunged forward with his arms open and scooped up all three women, sweeping them back as the log landed in a volcano of sparks and dust and ash in the exact spot they’d gathered.
It was rather like being swept up by a brick wall.
He jerked away the moment they’d been deposited to safety, leaving Cecelia feeling oddly bereft. To wield such tremendous strength was unimaginable to her.
But to be buttressed by it. Shielded and supported by it.
To rely upon and be rescued by it.
How extraordinary.
Ash and dust filmed her spectacles, obstructing her vision completely. The grit of it gathered on her face and settled in a chalky-tasting skein on her teeth. A fit of wheezing coughs overtook her, and she bent forward with her hand over her mouth to regain her breath.
No one said a word, but a handkerchief was thrust into her hand.
Cecelia wiped the dust and ash from her lips, nose, and chin so she could breathe.
It smelled like him. Like clean linen, sharp soap, and … books.
She paused to pull the scent deep into her beleaguered lungs before swiping off her spectacles to clean them with the unsoiled side of the soft cloth.
She searched the gardens anxiously, noting that Frank and Alexander were gaining their balance and their breath behind her, but were otherwise unharmed.
Phoebe stood safely some distance away, pressed against the far wall, her features indistinguishable.
Jean-Yves had thankfully been conducted from the room by the medics before the log fell.
No harm done. Cecelia opened her mouth to thank Ramsay, but he spoke before she was able.
“Jesus kilt-lifting Christ. It’s ye.”
It was hard to discern from his voice if he was more furious or incredulous.
Cecelia glanced over at him, finding nothing but the blunt shapes of his features and the stunning size of everything else. Then she held her glasses up to bring the world—and the man—into focus.
Catching her reflection in the one window that remained intact, she saw what Ramsay did. The soot about her face was shaped very much like a masquerade mask. Covered thusly, without her spectacles on and her hair dusted with ash and debris, she unequivocally resembled the woman he’d met only yesterday in the ruined residence.
The woman he detested.
The Scarlet Lady.
“It is I,” she confessed upon a wistful sigh.
She’d kissed Ramsay …
And never would again judging by the antipathy with which he currently regarded her.
His hair had become disheveled, and the high collar of his crisp suit was now smudged with grime, his necktie missing. But his eyes. His eyes glinted with silver storms, the blue vanishing almost completely.