These thoughts went through Rose’s head distractedly as she let out an irritated breath. She was cold, rain pounded down on the roof, and who knew how long it would be before Steven and Albert’s staff could trundle a wagon down here?
The dog left Rose’s side to circle the room, his head down. He might smell rats or birds—the dog would have been trained to fetch grouse or other game from fields after a shoot.
She watched him abstractedly until he started pawing at the wall opposite the door. More than pawing. He let out a bark and scrabbled at the paneling with his paws.
Rose went to him, curiosity spilling through her anger. “What have you found, lad?”
The dog looked up at her, tail moving, pleased with himself. He pawed again at the paneling, and it started to come away.
Instead of a stone wall behind it, Rose saw emptiness, and felt a wash of air. “A secret passage?” she asked, bending down to peer inside. “I adore secret passages.” Sittford House had several, which Charles had delighted in showing Rose. They’d led between bedrooms—which had set them to laughing at Charles’s naughty ancestors.
“Shall we be sensible and wait for Steven?” Rose asked the dog. “Or see what’s in there?”
The dog sniffed the opening, looked up at Rose again, then shook himself and plunged inside.
That settled that. Rose moved the panel aside, propping it against the wall, then she ducked into the opening, and hurried after the dog.
***
“Rose!”
Steven shouted for her as he jogged up the path to the summerhouse, moving far faster than the wagon creaking along behind him. The wind was biting, icy. The rain would turn to snow before the evening was out, he’d wager. The sooner Steven got Rose back to London, the better.
“Rosie?”
The summerhouse was now in deep shadow from the waning afternoon. The builders had raised it on a fairly high foundation in order to accommodate a set of stone stairs that ran all the way around it.
Woods seemed to have grown up onto the porch since Steven had gone—thick, dead branches blocked the door, reaching halfway up the wall above it.
“Rose!” Steven bellowed.
His shouts turned to swear words as he ran up onto the porch. Someone had dragged huge branches across the door, blocking the way in—or out. Through the limbs he could see the ebony and gold settee, the gilding he’d rubbed clean shining in the dim light.
“Dear God.” Steven pulled away the branches, tearing his gloves and bloodying his hands. “Rose!”
No answer. No cries of help from Rose trapped inside, no barks of the dog he’d left with her. Bloody useless animal.
The wagon stopped behind him at the edge of the trees. The driver, one of the farmers, climbed slowly from his perch, the boy he’d recruited to help, holding the horses.
Steven yelled to them. “Help me shift this lot!”
The farmer came panting up, stared in amazement at the dead branches covering a piece of broken furniture, then joined Steven in pulling the things away.
Steven’s heart hammered, and his stomach roiled. Who the hell had shut Rose in here? He thought he knew the answer, and his rage flared.
“I’ll kill him,” he snarled. “I don’t care if he is a bloody duke. Rosie!”
No answer. Steven shoved the remains of the settee out of the way and reached for the door handle. Locked again, damn it.
Instead of fumbling for the key, Steven simply yanked the door from its hinges. It fell, but he shoved it aside and ran in, calling Rose’s name.
The place was empty. Rose wasn’t here. Steven’s relief was closely followed by another terrifying question—then where the hell was she?
He ran out. “Rose!” The woods were growing darker, the rain falling hard. “Rosie! Damn it. Answer me!”
“Guv,” the wagon driver who’d follow him inside, called out to him. “Come and see this.”
Steven charged back into the summerhouse. The driver stood looking at something on the wall, hidden by the broken pile of furniture, which seemed to have become even more broken. A black square about four feet high and three feet wide opened on the back wall, a panel of peeling yellow paint leaning next to it.
The question was not whether Rose had gone into that opening. It was how far had she gone, and what had happened to her once inside?
“I need lanterns,” Steven snapped. “Fetch them. Now!”
The driver didn’t bother explaining that he didn’t work for Steven. He obeyed without question.
Steven was kneeling in front of the opening, peering into the darkness when both driver and his son ran up, each carrying a lantern. Steven snatched one from the boy’s hands. “Stay here in case she turns up,” he told the boy then looked at the driver. “You, come with me.”
“I should go, sir,” the boy said, taking his father’s lantern. “I’m smaller.”
Steven had no wish to drag a young lad into danger, whatever that might be. The father, though, nodded. “He can wriggle into tight places like a worm,” he said proudly. “He’s your man.”
Steven still didn’t like taking a child into that hole, but he had to conceded that the driver did not look much capable of crawling about in the dark.
“You stay behind me,” Steven said to the boy. “And don’t lose sight of me.”
“Yes, sir,” the lad said.
Without further word, Steven ducked into the darkness.
Chapter Fourteen
Steven had to stoop in the low tunnel, but he kept on. He called Rose’s name every few feet, echoed by the boy’s “Your Grace?” but silence was their only answer.
At every step, Steven dreaded to come across Rose, lying incoherent, ill, or worse. His entire being filled with panic. He knew the only way he’d relieve it was to find Rose, take her in his arms, and hear her whisper, “Hush, Steven, I’m all right.”
He’d plunged into the game of being Rose’s betrothed, at first to let Laura Ellis release herself from him, as well as for the fun of it. At least, that’s what he’d told himself. Steven knew now that he’d followed his instincts to latch on to Rose and not let her go.
She’d steadied him with gentle hands the night he’d fallen drunkenly into her, and Steven wanted her to steady him the rest of his life. He needed her. No—it went beyond need.
He loved her.
Steven had been telling her the past few days, in a light tone, that he considered them engaged in truth, and that they’d marry soon. Rose had laughed with him as though she thought him joking.