Kit met Smiggs’s relieved gaze and tipped his head toward the downed watchman, who chose that moment to groan. Kit didn’t want to think of what the man’s fate would have been had he and the others not arrived in time.
In time to stop Nunsworth bludgeoning Sylvia to death.
The ice that had flooded Kit on realizing what Nunsworth had planned still chilled him.
He spun and went down on one knee beside the lady who now held his heart.
She was tugging at her still-bound right hand; she flicked him a frowning glance. “I thought I had it, but no.” She tugged at the knotted rope. “Blast it!”
Relief that she was safe—and well enough to frown at him and grumble—swamped him, only to rise in the next breath in a wave so intense and immense it threatened to choke him. He reached for her bound hand and managed to gruffly say, “Here—let me.”
She sniffed and desisted and let him have at the knot.
He worked swiftly, loosening the knot—wrenched tight by her panicked tugging—then unravelling it and unwinding the rope lashing her hand to the rails.
When her hand, still in its glove, was finally free, she drew it close, massaging her no doubt bruised flesh. Kit helped her to sit upright, tugged her other glove free of the rope and handed it to her, then swung around and sat beside her.
When, still rubbing her abused hand, she leaned lightly against him, something deep inside him settled and subsided. After a second, he raised his arm, draped it around her shoulders, and drew her closer—and she came.
That entity inside him who viewed her as his calmed a little more.
Together, they watched Smiggs, who had unbarred and opened the main door, help the watchman outside.
Ned and Ollie had armed themselves with identical metal poles to the one Jack wielded. Any attempt by Nunsworth to so much as lift his head was met by a hail of sharp raps on the pail; he’d learned to lie still.
“You came for me.” Sylvia’s ungloved fingers slipped into Kit’s hand where it rested on his thigh.
Kit gripped—harder than he’d intended. Gentling his hold, his gaze still on the boys, he softly snorted at the silliness of her words. “I will always come for you no matter what monster tries to steal you away.”
He turned his head enough to meet her gaze as, with an unvoiced question in her eyes, she looked at him. He read that question and replied, “I’m not about to let anyone steal my future.”
Lost in the warm caramel of his eyes, Sylvia felt her heart, which had slowed, start to beat faster. She arched her brows. “Your future?”
His lips eased. His gaze still locked with hers, he raised her hand to his lips and brushed a kiss across her knuckles. “You,” he whispered. “You are my future, and I’m not of a mind to allow anyone to steal the years I hope you’ll agree to share with me.”
Her heart leapt, then raced. She studied his eyes. “Is that an offer, my lord?”
He tipped his head, his lips curving. “Not as such, but it’s the promise of one.” His expression remained relaxed, but there was seriousness behind his next words. “You’re a clergyman’s daughter—I plan to do everything by the book in wooing you.”
She felt her heart soften and shift, and in that instant, she knew to her soul that her heart was already his
.
That she’d succumbed to this nobleman reputed to be a rakehell, who was, in fact, so much more.
Certainty filled her; she let it show in her eyes, let the radiance of it fill her smile.
“M’lord, what do you want us to do with this blighter?”
Ollie’s question broke the moment. Together with Kit, Sylvia looked to where the three boys still had their attention focused on the fallen Nunsworth.
“He’s getting squirrelly,” the lad, who Sylvia had realized from the boys’ exchanges was none other than Jack the Lad, reported.
And, indeed, Nunsworth appeared to be trying to surreptitiously shift into a position from which he could swing away from the boys.
Not that they would let him escape.
Smiggs lumbered up, a length of heavy rope in his hands. “The watchman told me where to find this. He’s—pardon the pun—ropeable about letting Nunsworth down him.”