Loving Lady Georgianna (Spirited #2)

Chapter 13

Nothing gave a man more clarity in his drunken stupor than when, upon entering a woman's bedchamber, the ability to be caught took hold.

Thorne could just imagine facing the guillotine not only for being in the chamber of a woman who had been on the dangerous end of falling stone, but a woman whose hand was currently placed within the Duke of Burkeley's. Thorne was many things, but socially suicidal wasn't one of them.

The door rattled and Thorne made himself appear as small as possible. In actuality, it wasn't much considering Georgie - though particularly tall for a woman - hardly hid an inch of his own six-foot-four height.

He felt like a bloody giant next to her. One who was currently leaning to one side.

Did time slow down when one was facing certain death?

Thorne had to wonder how a duke went about defending his betrothed's virtue? Would Thorne get a slap to his cheek with a richly made tanned glove? Would his palms be rapped with a birch rod like an errant schoolboy?

Thorne could hardly see Burkeley wrestling him to the ground. That big, bumbling lummox couldn't possibly be remotely agile on his feet.

His drunken musings were cast to the wayside as the door swung inward. Georgie, for her part, did a remarkable representation of blending into the wall, stiffening like a bit of plaster.

So, it was on tenterhooks Thorne waited for the least likely of all people to come charging through the entrance. It wasn't Georgie's mother with her robe concealing a frilled nightgown. It wasn't even Burkeley come to skewer him with a starched bit of neckcloth.

It was...

A woman wielding a...

Thorne squinted, but the inebriation in his body only made his surroundings blurry, oblong shapes.

But yes, she did appear to be holding a coal scuttle, of all things.

The ends clattered as it open and shut with the lady's maid's shuffled steps as she careened around the corner and swung it at his head like a sword.

"Miss!" she huffed, setting aside the candle in her other hand and squinting into the low light of the room. "Are ye under attack? Do ye need me to give him a good smack atop the head?"

In the end, the madwoman didn't need to. A knot of air snuck under the boot of Thorne's foot and he found himself tripping backwards... "Ack!"

Thump!

The wall cracked against his back and Thorne toppled to the side, an invisible hand grasping him by the back of his trousers. Thorne frantically sought to catch his tumbling form only for the ground to meet him too fast. His knees buckled and...

BOOM!

His bum crashed to the ground.

Thorne looked up into the amused gaze of Georgie only for the maid to capture his attention as she threw down her weapon, huffing in indignation. "Gah! The man couldn't hurt a flea in 'is condition."

Rolling up her sleeves, the heathen marched to him, clenching her fists as if she would knock him in the teeth.

Thorne's brows shot up. Surely not.

Georgie, however, must have thought exactly that for she stole before Thorne's body as if to shield him. "Clarissa. What in heaven's name are you doing?"

Georgie looked so preposterous on his behalf - standing half clad in her nightgown as she fought her lady's maid for him - that Thorne couldn't resist teasing her. He tsked. "Such language, Georgie," Thorne cast a hand to his chest as he tried valiantly to stand on his own two feet. It only earned him an eye roll from his unwilling audience. "Does Burkeley know the hoyden he is to marry?"