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Ignoring that, he fired his most deadly weapon, the threat guaranteed to demolish her resistance. "Arik is holding your sister prisoner, not to be released until I give the signal. If you do anything to prevent me signaling him, I wouldn't like to think what he might do to her."
What little fight Je
"Take your hand away," she said wearily. "I won't cry out. You can trust-"
The last sentence was a mistake; she knew it the instant the words escaped her lips and she saw his face tighten with furious contempt. "Get up!" he snapped, jerking her out of bed. Reaching out into the darkness, he snatched up the velvet wedding gown lying across a trunk at the foot of her bed and thrust it into her arms. Clutching the gown to her bosom, Je
"Shall I fetch you a dagger to use as well?" he jeered icily, and before she could reply, he snapped, "Get dressed!"
When she'd do
Je
"Hold onto the rope with your hands," he ordered mercilessly as he Wrapped the other end of the rope around his wrist, "and use your feet to hold your body away from the wall." Without hesitation he lifted her off her feet and onto the sill.
Seeing the terror in her enormous eyes as she clutched mindlessly at both sides of the window casing, Royce said curtly, "Don't look down. The rope is stout, and I've lowered far heavier burdens than you."
A moan rose in Je
"Push away from the wall with your feet," he ordered sharply. Je
And in that most unlikely-and least desirable-of moments, hanging eighty feet above a deep moat with only a strong pair of hands and a stout rope to keep her from plunging to her death, Je
Royce's head jerked toward her, his face a mask of almost comical disbelief as he realized the utter helplessness of his plight, for he could neither reach for his dagger to threaten her, nor dash across the room to silence her.
At any other time, Je
Royce was wondering the same thing as he stared through the darkness at the elderly woman who had, for some incomprehensible reason of her own, deliberately waited until this impossible moment to present herself. He glanced at the rope biting into his wrists, automatically testing the tension, and then he finally answered her question. "I'm abducting your niece."
"Just as I thought."
Royce peered at her closely, uncertain whether Je
"I could open the door behind me and call for help," she said, "but since you have Bre
"No," Royce agreed with hesitation. "Probably not."
For an endless moment their gazes locked as they assessed one another, and then she said, "Of course, you could be lying, which I ca
"I could be," Royce agreed cautiously.
"Then again, you might not. How did you manage to scale the wall?"
"How do you think I did?" Royce replied, shifting his gaze to the rope and stalling for time. His shoulders straining, his lower body braced against the wall, he continued slowly letting out the rope, hand over hand.
"Perhaps one of your men came up here during supper, pretending he wished to use the garderobe, since there was a crowd outside the one in the hall. Then he slipped in here, anchored the rope to that chest beneath the window, and tossed the other end out the window."
Royce confirmed her completely accurate conclusion with a slight, mocking inclination of his head. Her next words brought him another jolt-this time of alarm. "On further reflection, I do not think you're holding Bre
Royce, who had deliberately misled Je
"For one thing, my nephew was posting guards in the hall at the foot of the stairs when I retired this eve-undoubtedly to prevent something such as this. And so, in order to take Bre
That summary was so concise and so correct that Royce's opinion of the old woman climbed another notch. "On the other hand," he drawled calmly, watching her closely, trying to judge Je
"That's quite true," she agreed.
Royce breathed an inward sigh of relief that turned into alarm as she added, "But I do not believe you have Bre
His brows snapped together. "What sort of bargain?"
"In return for my not summoning the guards now, you will lower me out of that window and take me with you tonight."
If she'd invited him to join her in bed, Royce would not have been more stu
"In that case," she said, turning and extending her hand to the door, "you leave me no choice, young man-"
Stifling an oath at his current helplessness, Royce continued letting the rope play out. "Why should you want to go with us?"
Her voice lost its imperious confidence and her shoulders drooped a little. "Because my nephew means to send me back into seclusion on the morrow, and I truly ca
"Why?"
"Because," Aunt Elinor replied, "my niece, as you well know, can be a troublesome woman; however, she will do as I tell her."