"You followed me?"
"Of course. Once I saw you go inside this place, I decided to see if it would provide me with the opportunity I wanted. And it has. The key to this chamber was right outside the door. I picked it up on my way in, then locked the door behind me." Morland pulled a heavy metal key out of his pocket and displayed it with a chuckle. Then he dropped it back into his coat.
"I will scream."
"No one will hear you. The walls of this room are made of stone and are very thick. And no one will be coming down the stairs now because the place is closed for the night."
Harriet edged backward a few more steps. She was almost to the end of the aisle. In a moment she would be able to dart around the corner of the last cabinet and run back up the neighboring aisle. She did not know what she would do then, but she would think of something, she assured herself. In the meantime she must try to stall Morland.
"Why are you so determined to gain revenge against St. Justin?" Harriet asked. "What has he ever done to you?"
"What has he done?" Fury flashed across Bryce's handsome face. "Like so many others of his kind, he had everything. He always did. And I had nothing. Nothing. My family and his were neighbors for years. When I was growing up I had to watch him and his older brother getting the best of everything. Horses, carriages, clothes, schools."
"Mr. Morland, listen to me."
"Do you know what it was like? No, of course you do not. Important people came to visit at Blackthorne Hall. Everyone courted the favor of the Earl of Hardcastle. I had to be grateful for simply getting an invitation to a Hardcastle ball. I was lucky to be asked to join the local hunt. My parents were mere country gentry. They groveled to the Earl of Hardcastle. But I have never groveled to him or his sons. I have been their equal."
"How can you say that St. Justin had everything?" Harriet demanded.
"He is heir to an earldom and a vast fortune while I was obliged to marry a tradesman's daughter in order to have the kind of money I needed. It was not fair."
"You called yourself his friend."
Morland shrugged elegantly. "Friends in his circle are extremely useful to a man in my position. Friends like St. Justin can get one into the best clubs, the best drawing rooms, the best beds. I make it a practice to acquire friends like St. Justin. But St. Justin is no longer particularly useful and he has offended me."
Harriet stared at him. "You tell yourself that you are superior to him, do you not? You tell yourself that while he has wealth and a title, you are far more clever, more handsome, more attractive to women than he is."
"It is true."
"But you hate him because you know deep in your soul that he is a far better man than you will ever be. And it is not his wealth or his title that makes him superior. It is something deeper, something you will never possess. Is that it, Mr. Morland?"
"If you say so, my dear."
"What will hurting me prove?"
Bryce's eyes glittered. "It will prove once again that I can take St. Justin's women away from him. After I have you, I will have the satisfaction of knowing that I have had both of the women St. Justin thought were his. It is little enough, but I enjoy the sport."
"You are a fool, Mr. Morland. You must know what St. Justin will do when he discovers that you have tried to attack me."
"Oh, I do not think you will tell him about our little tryst, madam." Bryce gave her a knowing look. "Women do not usually confess to having been with another man, even when they are taken by force. They are afraid they will be blamed for it, I think. And any woman married to the Beast of Blackthorne Hall would never admit to having been unfaithful to him. She would be too afraid to do so. The Beast will surely turn on her."
Harriet's fingers found the end of the last cabinet. "I would not be afraid to tell St. Justin. He would believe me and he would most certainly avenge me."
"He is far more likely to murder you," Bryce said as he closed the distance between them. "And you are wise enough to know that. He would not be able to tolerate knowing that his new bride, the woman he has displayed so proudly to the ton, has been unfaithful already."
"You know nothing about him." Without warning, Harriet whipped around the corner of the row of cabinets.
Bryce lunged at her, eyes alight with an unholy fire.
Harriet fled down the second aisle of cabinets. Bryce was right behind her. He would catch her in another two strides.
She saw the chair she had used when she had examined the forged fossil. It was standing where she had left it in the middle of the aisle. She jumped up on the seat and scrambled up onto the top of the cabinets just as Bryce grabbed at her skirts.
He missed.
Harriet raced along the top of the cabinets, scattering skulls and femurs and vertebrae into the aisle below. Bryce pounded along in the aisle, obviously intending to catch her at the far end when she tried to reach the door.
"You may as well come down now, you little bitch. There is only one way this can end." There was a terrible sexual excitement in Bryce's voice now.
Harriet ignored him. Her goal was the large stone sitting on top of the last cabinet in the aisle, the one that contained the fossil impression of a large, spiny fish. She prayed the stone would not be too heavy for her to lift.
Bryce never guessed her intention. It probably did not occur to him that a woman would resort to such a means of defending herself or that a woman would be strong enough to do so even if she tried.
But Harriet had been digging fossils out of solid rock for years. She had spent hours wielding a mallet and chisel. She knew she was no weakling.
She grabbed hold of the chunk of stone and hurled it down at Bryce's blond head just as he reached up to grasp her ankle.
At the last instant Bryce realized what was happening. "Damn you, no." Bryce's yell was choked off as he tried to leap back out of the way.
But he was too late. He barely managed to avoid the full impact of the heavy stone. As it was, it caught him a glancing blow on his head and bounced heavily on his shoulder before falling to the floor with a crash.
Bryce stumbled and went down. He lay very still, his eyes closed. Blood leaked from under a lock of blond hair that curled over his forehead.
A terrible silence filled the shadowed room full of bones.
Harriet stood on top of the cabinets, gasping for breath. Her heart was pounding and her hands were trembling. She stared down at Bryce, unable to think clearly for a moment.
Then she forced herself to scramble down from the top of the cabinets. She was afraid to go over to Bryce. She did not know if he was dead and she did not want to find out.
But she needed the key to get out of the chamber.
Harriet took several deep breaths and approached Bryce's still form very cautiously. When he did not stir or open his eyes she dropped to her knees beside him and reached into his pocket for the key.
Her fingers closed around the heavy iron object. She withdrew it quickly. It felt cold in her hand. Bryce still did not move. She could not tell if he was even breathing.
Harriet waited no longer. She ran to the door, inserted the key into the lock, and opened it.
She was free.
She dashed up the stairs to the ground floor and found everything shrouded in shadows. The heavy drapes on the front windows had been drawn against the late afternoon sun.
The door of Mr. Humboldt's private study opened. A stooped, heavily whiskered figure loomed in the doorway rather like a large spider. The figure scowled ferociously at her. "Here, now, you ain't the cook with my supper. What the devil are you doing here? All the visitors are supposed to be gone by now."
"I was just on my way."