Page 38 of The Duchess Games

A pack of aristocratic ladies would stab her with their diamond hairpins long before.

Chapter Fourteen

Cat elected to stay on the beach a little longer after everyone else returned to the house. The maids helped the others on with their gowns, the footmen returned for the hampers of wet towels. She was finally alone and able to breathe again as she walked into the softly churning sea. She was unaccustomed to maids and their polite, distant eyes on her all the day long, to footmen and butlers and housekeepers. To aristocrats in any number and certainly in such numbers. She missed her quiet kitchen in the morning—if not the dozens of tasks that was required of her. She missed her dogs.

The sea washed away the worst of the anxious worries, of her thoughts looping on themselves, fueling a tremble in her chest, like she had stepped off an extra stair without realizing it. The drop of her stomach, the tilt of the world around, the slam into reality. Honestly, it was exhausting.

Here, for a blessed long moment, she only had to tilt against the waves, not the entire world. She wouldn’t win, of course, water always won. But at least there was joy in this kind of fight. Exhilaration. The cold water stole her breath when she plunged into a wave, and she came up grinning. Gulls wheeled overhead, shouting at her when they realized she had no crumbs, no fish guts, nothing but appreciation for their flight. You couldn’t eat appreciation.

Refusing to let her thoughts derail into darker territories, she let the waves push her to shore. The sun warmed the top of her head, water dripping from her heavy hair and the hem of her chemise.

It would have soaked her dress—if she still had a dress.

She rushed to the stone where she knew perfectly well she had left her folded dress, her stays and her stockings. Her shoes.

Nothing but sunlight and water dripping from her hair onto the stone.

Someone had stolen her clothing.

She was stunned for a full minute before anger shimmered through her. She couldn’t prove it was Lady Siddal’s doing of course, but she didn’t know anyone else with that kind of petty dislike. And she had been rather vexed to have tied with a “fishing girl.” Cat looked down at her wet chemise which was shockingly transparent. She couldn’t be seen like this. Bad enough when it was dry, but it was positively indecent in this condition.

With a sigh, she stretched out on a smooth stone ridge around the pool and let the sun dry her as best it could. It was warm and quiet, and she drowsed despite herself. When she woke fully to a gull complaining very loudly near her ear, her chemise was damp but passable.

Best get to it.

She climbed the cliff steps and poked her head up before moving to the grassy path. No one and nothing but fields and the house in the distance. She knew from her morning walk that she could dart around the side garden, climb over the stone wall, and pop through one of the side servant doors with none the wiser.

The only tricky part was crossing the gravel walk at the edge of the formal hedges. It was more open than she liked. Someone might spy her from the house or if they were taking a turn around the garden. She reminded herself that she did not particularly care what the others thought about her, only about bringing in the next cargo. She felt a bit better and much worse.

She’d only been at Penhallow a few days and her whole sense of self was turned upside down.

Well, not her entire character.

That fact became blazingly clear when she saw three ladies on the path. One of whom shrieked and kicked her foot out. It wasn’t until Cat realized Lady Siddal had kicked Bartholomew the turtle that she felt fury. Not the inconvenience or embarrassment of a schoolroom prank that left her in the unmentionables. Not annoyance.

Fury.

She was her mother’s daughter in that moment.

And definitely in the next, when Lady Siddal kicked the poor turtle again.

The first kick was no doubt out of fear, the second was anger. Luckily, Bartholomew was old and wide and made of sterner stuff. And luckily for Lady Siddal, he did not close his snapping jaw around her foot and chomp it like an apple. More’s the pity. Instead, he pulled his head in sharply.

Cat did not realize she had moved or made any conscious decision until she had already launched herself at Lady Siddal. A village girl in her wet chemise seizing retribution for a turtle.

She never landed.

A strong arm banded around her midsection, seizing her from the air. Her wild battle yell strangled in her throat. Callum’s chest pressed against her back. She’d know him anywhere, the smell of salt and wind and expensive spices.

“Ladies,” he said starkly before hauling her away. She fought his hold like any wild creature, to no avail. Lady Siddal and the two other ladies gaped after them. Bartholomew trundled into the hedges, creating chaos and then deserting it, as usual.

“Let go,” Cat said to Callum between her teeth.

He hefted her closer, tighter. His mouth was near her ear. “Not until you calm down.”

She was struggling out of instinct, but there was something delicious about the solid warmth of him pressing against her. About the strength in his arms, his breath in her ear.

He went through a side door and then turned sharply, kicking open another door. They found themselves in an empty closet, the kind reserved for cloaks and beaver-brimmed hats during formal events.