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beautiful—don't laugh, you know as well as I that it would take more than the ravages of a Spanish winter to destroy your looks. You'd be fair game for any French soldier and for more than a few of our own. This is no time to be swayed by petty vindictiveness."
    "You expect me to take your advice on the evils of petty vindictiveness?" Caroline asked, getting to her feet so they were on an equal level.
    "Why not?" Adam returned. "You should admit I'm an expert on the subject."
    Caroline gave a harsh laugh. "Don't try to get round me with words, Adam. I'm not a child anymore. I can't be bamboozled and I can't be bullied."
    "I don't doubt it. You are also, I trust, mature enough to put the welfare of your child before your own anger."
    "How dare you." Criticism of her care of Emily was more than Caroline could bear. She would not let herself pause to consider the possible justice of this remark. "If you imagine for one moment that I don't think about Emily every minute of every day, that I don't remember that if it wasn't for me she wouldn't be here—" To her own disgust, Caroline felt tears welling in her eyes. Her legs began to buckle again and she gripped the table for support.
    "Caro—"Adam reached out to her, his voice suddenly soft.
    Caroline recoiled as if she had been struck. "I want you to leave, Adam. Now."
    Even as she spoke the door from the street swung open. "All set," said a cheerful voice. "Oh." The speaker, a dark-haired, compactly built man, drew up short at the sight of Caroline. "Sorry, ma'am. Didn't realize you were back."
    "You remember Hawkins, Caroline," Adam said smoothly, as if she could possibly forget anything that had happened on the night they had last met. "You've seen to the horses?" he asked, turning to Hawkins.
    "Right." Hawkins closed the door. "We can leave whenever the lady and her husband are ready."
    "My husband is dead," Caroline informed him, "and I am not going anywhere."
    "Ah." Hawkins looked from Adam to Caroline. "I understand the problem, Mrs. Rawley. Durward often rubs people the wrong way. But in this case you'd be wise to listen to him."
    Caroline felt her resolution waver, but the sight of Hawkins's cheerful face and the memory of the last time she had seen him decided her. "No."
    Adam did not reply, for he was staring past her, his whole body suddenly tense. Caroline looked at him in puzzlement. Then she heard it too: hoofbeats, loud enough to indicate that the riders had reached the cobblestones of the street. They slowed abruptly, and the clip of the horses' hooves gave way to a medley of screams and, louder than all the rest, a volley of shots.
    The sound banished all thought from Caroline's head but an image of Emily, sitting patiently in the back room while destruction threatened to burst through the door at any moment. "You said you had horses," she said.
    Adam shook his head. "If we run, we're prime targets." His gaze moved to Hawkins. "There's a little girl in the back room. Stay with her. Keep her quiet, keep her calm. Tell her her mother will be with her presently. Caroline," he continued, stripping off his coat and casting it over a chair back, "I'm going to need your help."
    Before Caroline realized what was happening he had crossed to her side and his hands were closing on her arms. "I'm sorry," he said, as she flinched, "but they'll be here at any moment and this charade has to be convincing."
    Caroline looked up at him, suspicion warring with the knowledge that he was her only hope. "What charade?"
    "That you're my mistress," Adam said.
    Knowing there must be some logic behind his words, Caroline bit back a protest. "And who are you?" she demanded.
    "Captain St. Juste of the French Army," said Adam, drawing her to him.
     

Chapter Two
    This was play-acting, Caroline told herself, and Emily's life and her own might depend on it. There was no room for fear or rancor or, God help her, passion. Adam was holding her crudely, an arrogant officer fondling his peasant