“But—”

“Not another word unless it's a confession.”

“But—”

“That's it!” He stuffed a rag into her mouth. “You'll have plenty of time to talk later, Miss De Leon.”

Caroline coughed and grunted furiously as he bound her wrists with a coarse piece of rope. Then, to her amazement, he put two fingers into his mouth, and let out a low whistle. A glorious black gelding pranced out of the trees, its steps high and graceful.

While she was gaping at the horse—who must have been the quietest and best-trained animal in the history of creation—the man hefted her up onto the saddle.

“Iiiii shrr …” she croaked, quite unable to speak with the grimy gag in her mouth.

“What?” He looked over at her and took in the way her skirts were cutting into her legs. “Oh, your skirts. I can cut them or you can dispense with propriety.”

She glared at him.

“Propriety goes, then,” he said, and hiked her skirts up so that she could straddle the horse with more comfort. “Sorry I didn't think to bring a side-saddle, Miss De Leon, but trust me when I tell you that you've far greater worries just now than my seeing your bare legs.”

She kicked him in the chest.

His hand closed painfully around her ankle. “Never,” he spat out, “kick a man who is pointing a gun at you.”

Caroline stuck her nose in the air and looked away. This farce had gone on quite long enough. As soon as she got rid of this blasted gag she'd tell this brute she'd never even heard of his Miss Carlotta De Leon. She would bring the force of the law down on his head so fast he'd be begging for the hangman's noose.

But in the meantime, she would have to settle for making his life miserable. As soon as he mounted the horse and settled into the saddle behind her, she elbowed him in the ribs. Hard.

“What now?” he snapped.

She shrugged innocently.

“Another move like that and I'm stuffing a second rag in your mouth. And this one is considerably less clean than the first.”

As if that were possible, Caroline thought angrily. She didn't even want to think about where her gag had resided before her mouth. All she could do was glare at him, and from the way he snorted at her she feared she didn't look fierce enough by half.

But then he set his horse into a canter, and Caroline realized that while they weren't riding toward Portsmouth, they also weren't heading anywhere near Prewitt Hall.

If her hands hadn't been bound she would have clapped them together with glee. She couldn't have escaped any faster if she'd arranged transport herself. This man might think she was someone else—a Spanish criminal to be precise—but she could straighten all that out once he'd taken her far, far away. In the meantime, she'd be quiet and still, and let him kick the horse into a full gallop.