Page 20 of Along Came a Rogue

Grey rushed to the door and pulled on the handle—locked. Behind him, he heard Emily gasp as she fought back a second scream.

“Where’s the key?” he asked evenly, forcing his voice to stay calm for her sake.

“I don’t have one—not in here—I never lock it—”

“Someone just did. Hedley!” He pounded his fist against the wooden panel. “Hedley, wake up!”

The commotion in the house grew louder around them. More crashes, more shattering glass, followed by the panicked sounds of running feet and muffled shouts.

“Stay back!” Grey ordered. Retreating a stride, he lunged forward and slammed his shoulder against the door. Then again. And again. But it didn’t budge.

“Grey, stop!” Emily rushed forward, her hand on his arm to pull him back. “Stop—you’ll hurt yourself!”

“I have to get us out of here.” He pounded at the door with his fist. “Hedley!”

Then he saw it—the first tendrils of gray smoke curling beneath the door. From the tightening of her fingers on his arm, he knew Emily saw it, too.

“The house is on fire,” she whispered, her face white with fear. “They’re burning it down around us.”

“The hell they will!” he growled.

He broke free of her grasp and ran to the window, tossed it open, and leaned over the sill, hoping for any kind of escape route. But there was no ledge connecting their room to the one beside them, and a two-story drop to the ground waited below. They were trapped. Jump from the window and die, or burn alive inside the room.

“Major!” From the opposite side of the door, Hedley pulled frantically at the handle, but the lock wouldn’t give. “It won’t open!”

“There’s a key downstairs in the kitchen,” Emily cried out.

“Forget the key,” Grey ordered. “Go fetch an ax from the stable and chop the damned door down!”

“Aye, Major!”

As Hedley’s footsteps pounded away, Emily grabbed his hand. Her fingers laced tightly through his as if she were afraid she’d lose him if she let go. “But the key is downstairs.”

“Brat.” He cupped her face in his free hand to hold her still while he explained as calmly as he could given the chaos unfolding around them, “Whoever is doing this locked us into the room so we couldn’t get out before they set the place on fire. They would have thought to take the key from the kitchen so no one could unlock us.”

She choked out a terrified sob.

“But Hedley will get us out, count on it,” he reassured her, although he didn’t feel all that certain himself. “And I will protect you. Do you trust me?”

Sucking in a shaking breath, she nodded jerkily. “With my life.”

“Good.” Her soft admission stirred a warmth deep inside his chest. Later he would let himself wonder what that meant, but now— “Help me find a way out of this room.”

He snatched up the iron fireplace poker and began to pound it against the door handle, hoping to break it free so he could ram the poker inside and twist open the lock. Smoke billowed beneath the door now, the smell acrid and pungent as the wood panels grew warm to the touch.

“Could you shoot the lock open?” she asked desperately.

“If I had my gun.” But he’d left it in his room, not thinking he’d need a weapon inside a sleeping house.

He twisted the poker against the handle, trying to force open the lock as he pried at it, all the muscles in his arms and shoulders straining with brute force. But it didn’t give. With a curse, he raised the poker to strike the door again.

She waved a gun in front of his face. “Here!”

“What the hell—” He drew back in surprise and stared. A dueling pistol with pearl-inlay handle and acid-etched barrel, elegantly beautiful, and wholly impractical. And so old he wondered if it would even fire.

“Be careful,” she warned, “it’s loaded.”

He blinked. “You keep a loaded pistol in your sitting room?”