Page 47 of Ten Rules for Loving the Wrong Rake

He lay there. His hand on her thigh. His body hard against her leg. His brain trying to pivot from one thing to whatever she was talking about.

"That is not the response I was expecting," he said.

"I refuse to hide in a wardrobe while you fight three armed men in a tunnel." She sat up. The blanket fell to her waist. "If I play dead, I am useful instead of hiding. If you send one of them upstairs to check, I could attack him. Then you face two instead of three."

"Out of the question." He sat up beside her.

"I am not asking permission."

He rubbed his face. His arousal was being forcibly redirected by the sheer madness of this woman.

"I'm not putting you in danger. These men are thieves and murderers. They will not hesitate."

"I know. I would not suggest it if I did not have a plan. I am not a fool."

He sighed. He knew how determined she could be. "What do you have in mind?"

"A coffin. Plywood. Raised up on a table, closer to God. When whoever comes to check starts climbing, I throw quicklime in his face."

"You could get it on yourself. The structure could fall or he could pull the casket down. If you miss..."

"Then make the structure sturdy. As long as it holds, there is no chance of missing from above. He climbs, his face tilts up towards the coffin, I sit up and throw down. Gravity does the work."

"Audrey." He paused. "It is three in the morning. We do not have time for me to build a coffin, steps, and a platform in three hours. They will be here before dawn."

"Then we had better hurry."

She rolled out of bed and went to her room.

He sat on the edge of the mattress and listened to her moving through the wall. Drawers opening. Fabric rustling. The tap of her cane as she dressed.

He pulled on his boots and laced them. The knife went into the right one, handle down, the way it always did. He crossed to the wardrobe and reached behind it, into the gap between the back panel and the wall, and pulled out the pistol he had cleaned and loaded two days ago. A flintlock, single shot, taken from the stable where Marian had kept it wrapped in oilcloth beneath a loose board. He checked the flint, the pan, the charge. Dry. Set.

One shot. He tucked it behind him under the waistband and went to the stable for the timber.

He built the platform in the drawing room from timber and trestles, working by lantern light. Two trestles from the stable, braced with crossbeams nailed between the legs. He laid three planks across the top and nailed them down. The surface sat six feet off the ground, high enough that a man standing beneath could not reach the coffin without climbing.

Closer to God. That was the excuse. A devout household raising the body towards heaven before burial. It would look pious to anyone who did not think too hard about it, and Reeve's men were not the thinking kind.

He built the steps beside the platform. Three tiers from stacked planks, each ten inches high, braced at the sides but with the treads left loose, resting on the supports, unfixed. Under a man's weight they would groan and shift. Under a heavy man's weight they would crack.

He placed the coffin on the platform. Open lid. From the doorway the arrangement looked right: a body laid out on a raised bier, the boarded window behind it, the coffin framed against the grey light. A man entering the room would see it above him, would cross to the steps, would climb. His face would tilt up towards the box. His hands would reach for the edge.

"Get in," he said.

She climbed the steps. He lifted her into the coffin and she lay down, her hands crossed on her chest, her eyes closed. Her hair was loose. Her face was pale in the lantern light. She looked dead. She looked so convincingly dead that his chest lurched, and he had to touch her wrist to feel the pulse before he could breathe.

"How do I look?" she asked, eyes closed.

"Too convincing."

She opened one eye. "Too convincing?"

He kissed her knuckles. "Are you prepared for what you might witness?"

She sat up. "What do you mean?"

"Quicklime reacts to moisture. Eyes, mouth, sweat. The skin blisters. The eyelids swell shut. The flesh around them splits. He will scream. He may kick the structure. I will build it as sturdy as I can, but a panicking man is unpredictable. Are you certain?"