Michaela’s heart thrashed in her chest, and part of her wanted to spur her mount forward to the safety of Roderick’s side, even though she was still hurt and angry over his ultimatum of the night before. But another part of her warned her—in her mother’s voice, no less—to not get too close to Roderick Cherbon in this deep, quiet wood. It was dangerous, dangerous….
And then the hair on her arms stood up as the rumbling in her head was matched by reverberations in the road itself. Ahead of her, Roderick pulled his mount to a stop, turned his horse sideways in the middle of the road. As Michaela looked at him, she saw her own emotions reflected in his strong, scarred face: alarm, bewilderment, panic.
She was not imagining the hoofbeats. And they were getting closer.
Roderick’s horse half reared on its hind legs, causing Leo to squeal with delight, and Roderick had to fight the beast down. “Michaela, go back!” he called, his voice commanding and yet unsure at the same time. “Hurry!”
Michaela’s muscles tensed, ready to pull at the reins of the dancing mare, but Leo’s small face poking out of his hood caused her to kick the horse forward, calling, “Give me Leo!” even as her mount jumped toward them.
“There’s not time!” Roderick cried. “You must flee the wood now, Michaela—”
She skidded her mare sideways and the two mounts crashed together, pinning Roderick’s left leg from the knee down between the two barrel chests of the horses.
Roderick did not so much as cry out.
“Give him to me!” Michaela demanded. “Give him to me, now! Hurry!”
The hoofbeats were all around them now, shaking the tree limbs and jarring the bits of detritus on the road. Michaela reached for the boy in the same moment that Roderick was pushing Leo off his saddle by his rump, the little boy looking bewildered and frightened. He landed across Michaela and scrambled up her front to straddle her, his little arms around her neck like a noose.
“Now, go!” Roderick shouted. “Go!”
But it was too late. Both Roderick’s and Michaela’s heads swiveled to the bend in the road ahead, as the swelling of hooves broke in announcement of the arriving riders.
Michaela wrapped her arms around Leo and whispered, “Dear God, protect us!”
The sleek muzzle of a jet-black steed strained around the bend, steamy breath snorting from its nostrils, his rider tall and slender and clothed in the garb of a black knight. This craven stallion was instantly joined by its companion: a low, shaggy, white—
Pony.
“What in the name of fuck?” the black rider cried, and reined his horse to a halt, causing the stallion to scream indignantly. He threw back his coif.
The imposing rider on the dire-looking steed was none other than Sir Hugh Gilbert, Lord of Nothing.
And on the dainty little pony to his side rode young Lady Elizabeth Tornfield.
Roderick didn’t know whether to kiss Hugh, or strangle him. His heart was pounding so in his chest that he thought it to explode.
Had he expected to be descended upon by the Fortunes’ fabled Hunt? And Michaela had been as frantic to get her and Leo away from the road as had Roderick. Did she fear the same? He didn’t know, didn’t dare ask. But the maddening itch in his left boot had at last faded away to nothing once more.
“Lady Michaela!” the young girl cried, and kicked her pony into a run.
“Hello, Hoo!” Leo shouted, and waved a chubby arm at the black-clad rider.
Still at Roderick’s side, Michaela gasped. “Elizabeth! What in heaven’s name are you doing here?”
In seconds, the two small parties of riders were joined. Michaela handed Leo, arms already outstretched, to Hugh before dismounting and meeting the Tornfield girl in a consuming embrace. The little girl was sobbing uncontrollably.
“Hello, Pus,” Hugh said to Leo, and returned the boy’s embrace with a half smile. “The pair of you out for a jaunt with Miss Fortune, eh?” At these words he turned a raised eyebrow to Roderick. “Very cozy, Rick. How in holy hell did you manage to mount? Surely you didn’t have a stable hand help you—Miss Fortune, was it?”
Roderick waved the man’s question away with a careless hand, not prepared to answer Hugh now. In fact, he’d given no thought at all as to how he would explain his vastly improved condition to his friend. He dreaded the moment when Hugh would see him walk, or insist on helping him remove his footwear.
“What’s the girl doing here?” Roderick growled, glancing at Tornfield’s daughter still entangled with Michaela.
Hugh rolled his eyes and sighed. “She followed me, the sneaky little brat.”
“Why didn’t you return her?” Roderick asked in exasperation. The sight of Michaela so obviously happy to see the girl caused a nauseous swirl of unreasonable jealousy in Roderick. He wanted Michaela to have naught to do with her damnable Tornfields—especially not now, when they were so close to wedding.
“What? And waste more of my time?” Hugh shook his head. “I would have had to stay on another night, and she would have only followed me again. Persistent thing. I tell you, Rick, she was determined to reunite with her beloved Miss Fortune. Any matter, her father and stepmother aren’t far behind us. They can take her back themselves. I’m sleeping in my own bed tonight, right, Worm?” Hugh tweaked Leo’s nose and the boy giggled.
“Wite, Hoo.”
“Tornfield’s on your heels?” Roderick asked. He should brain Hugh. “Why could you not simply wait for them to catch up to you, then? Jesus, Hugh—I’ve no patience for this.”
“Ha! No, thank you.” Hugh laughed. “They’ve screeched and bellowed after me the entire way. I’ve dealt with them on my own long enough for my tastes. Besides, Harliss rides with them.” He gave an exaggerated shudder. “They seem to get on with her quite well. Shit-rat mad, the whole lot.”
At the mention of Harliss’s name, Leo clung to Hugh’s tunic, but his head turned to Roderick. “Her get me, Papa!”
Hugh beat him to answering the boy. “She wouldn’t dare, Squid. I’ll chop off her head and have it in a stew, first.”
Leo looked unconvinced, and sent worried eyes back to Roderick, as if seeking reassurance.
“She shan’t touch you, Leo,” Roderick said, and was certain to look directly into the boy’s eyes.
Leo’s thin chest gave a great heave and he patted Roderick’s shoulder. “All wite, Papa. All wite.”
Ignoring Hugh’s look of wary suspicion, Roderick turned his attention back to Michaela and the Tornfield girl—for a mute, she certainly did seem to talk a lot. Michaela was on her knees in the dirt, holding both of the girl’s hands in her own while the blond child sobbed and hiccoughed around her words, pleading over something or other.
The sight worried Roderick.
His dread only increased when, again, rumbling hooves echoed down the corridor of the tree-lined road, and in a moment, a trio of riders appeared.
“Don’t let them take me from you,” Elizabeth begged as the riders came into view. “Please, Michaela!”
“Elizabeth, you must go home with your father,” Michaela said, as gently as possible. She sympathized with the girl’s dislike of Juliette, but Michaela knew that Alan Tornfield loved his daughter to distraction, and would never let anything bad happen to her.
Well, that’s what Michaela thought, until she turned her head and saw Harliss accompanying the Tornfields.
“Oh, and they’ve brought Nurse, too!” Elizabeth sobbed. “She’ll be so disappointed!”
“Nurse?” Michaela asked in disbelief, and her head turned to find Roderick. The giant man only stared down at her, his earlier, strange, but most welcome joviality vanished. Michaela looked back at Elizabeth. “Your father has installed Harliss as your nurse?”
“Of course he has!” Elizabeth wailed, jerking on Michaela’s hands. “That’s what you wanted, isn’t it? I know you sent her to take care of me, and she is lovely, but I want you, Michaela!”
Michaela knew her mouth was hanging open.
She must speak to Alan immediately—and Juliette, as well, if need be. The Tornfields must not allow Harliss near any child, but especially not Michaela’s dear Elizabeth.
Good heavens, she and Roderick had sent the evil woman there as little more than a slave—not to be a respected family servant. The very thought made Michaela queasy.
“Elizabeth Tornfield!” Alan shouted as he brought his mount to a halt and swung down to the road. His face was ruddy beneath his blond hair. “I shall take a switch to you, young woman!”
“Papa, no!” Elizabeth cried, and darted behind Michaela, who rose to stand.
As Alan walked toward her, his blond hair seemed dull in the cloud-covered wood, his mustache ridiculous, his shoulders narrow. The skin of his face was perfect, unflawed—adolescently soft looking.
Even his stride wasn’t as manly as Michaela remembered. He had no heroic limp to speak of at all.
Alan stopped midway between where Michaela unwillingly sheltered Elizabeth and where Hugh and Roderick still sat their mounts.
“I beg pardon for this, Lord Cherbon,” Alan said stiffly, with a bow to match, in Roderick’s direction. “But I did call to your man—several times, actually—to stop. When we would start to gain on him, he would spur his mount.”
“You called?” Hugh said airily, eyes wide. “I’d no idea.”
“It is of no consequence,” Roderick growled. “Take your daughter and go, Tornfield.”
Lady Juliette urged her mount forward, her smile showing all two hundred of her big teeth. “Elizabeth, dear, you frightened us all so! Let us go home together—I am certain we can work everything out.”
“No!” Elizabeth shrieked from behind Michaela still. “You are not my mother! I hate you! I want to stay with Michaela!”
“Elizabeth!” Harliss snapped on a gasp. “That is a dreadful thing to say—you will apologize this instant!”
Michaela turned slightly to catch Elizabeth’s reaction and, to her surprise, the girl looked properly chastised.
“I’m sorry, Nurse.”
“Not to me,” Harliss clarified, and her gray eyes sparkled, her gray teeth flashed behind tight lips. “To Lady Juliette.”
“I’m sorry, Lady Juliette.”
Juliette’s smile faltered, but only for a moment. “It’s quite all right, my dear. We still have some—”
“But I don’t want to go back with them, any matter,” Elizabeth insisted, cutting off her stepmother’s attempt at magnanimity, and turning pleading eyes to Michaela once more. “I want to stay with you! Don’t you love me anymore? You didn’t even answer my letter!”
“Elizabeth, Tornfield Manor is no longer my home, and your place is with your father and Lady Juliette. I am to marry Lord Cherbon and live here with him and Leo.”
“And Sir Hugh,” Hugh chimed in sunnily.
Michaela only threw him a black look.
Harliss got down from her mount and made to approach Michaela and Elizabeth. “Elizabeth, listen to me—”
On Hugh’s lap, Leo whimpered and hid his face.
“Not one step closer, Harliss,” Roderick growled. “You’re frightening my son.”
For an instant, a glimpse of the old Harliss soaked through the false exterior, but she covered it up again with amazing speed.
“Forgive me, Lord Roderick,” Harliss simpered. “Hello, Leo. Darling, darling boy.” Then she turned to Elizabeth again. “We’ve discussed this: Lady Michaela can not be your companion any longer. She has come to Cherbon to care for little Leo, there, and I’m sure you can see that he is very, very much loved by her. She is to be his mother, you understand.”
The explanation should have been benign, but Michaela felt the twist of words as easily as a knife. She knew they cut Elizabeth.
“But I had her first!” Elizabeth cried. She looked up at Leo and then back to Michaela. “It’s because of him that you won’t come back, isn’t it? You love him more than me.”
Alan raised his face to the sky and sighed. “Elizabeth, don’t do this.” He stepped forward and took his daughter’s arm. “Come along, now. You have caused enough trouble, and we are going home.”
“It’s true, isn’t it?” The girl glanced back at the gray old hag as if for reassurance.
“Elizabeth, I do still love you. You are very, very dear to me.”
“But not dear enough,” the girl spat. “I’m not as dear as that sweet little baby, am I?”
“Ee-oh no baby!” Leo laid one palm against Hugh’s cheek, forcing him to look into his eyes. “Hoo, Ee-oh no baby, wite?”
“Absolutely not,” Hugh cried in outrage. “You are a properly grown pain in my arse.”
“No baby.” Leo turned his glare to Elizabeth and stuck out his tongue.
Michaela could not help the chirp of laughter that escaped her. It was very poor timing, though, as Elizabeth glared at her with bottomless humiliation in her eyes, and her chest heaved with entrapped sobs.
“Very well, M-Miss F-Fortune. Good riddance to you!” She turned and flounced back to Harliss, who readily took the girl into her long, gray arms.
The pain of Elizabeth’s rebuke stabbed at Michaela, but perhaps it was better for the girl to be angry now. Angry perhaps, but Michaela needed to ensure that she would be safe at Tornfield.
She reached out for Alan’s arm as he turned to go. “Lord Tornfield,” she said in a lowered voice. “About Harliss—”
“Oh. Yes, of course.” Alan turned and bowed stiffly again in Roderick’s direction. “Thank you, my lord, for sending Nurse to us. She has proven quite able and we are very pleased with her.”
“Harliss was not sent to you as a nurse, Tornfield,” Roderick said. “The woman was relieved of her position at Cherbon due to outrageous acts of insubordination, treachery, and the endangering of my own son.”
Alan looked shocked. He glanced back at Harliss, whom Michaela saw shake her head almost imperceptibly.
“I see,” Alan said, slowly.
Lady Juliette had the bad taste to add her opinion to an already-strained conversation. “Oh, well—you know, some humors are simply not compatible. She is working out quite splendidly for us, my lord.”
Michaela looked to Alan a final time. “I implore you, as a friend, and for Elizabeth’s sake—”
“Leave it, Michaela,” Alan said in a low voice. “We’re fine—as are you, apparently.” It sounded like an accusation.
“It was likely Harliss who urged Elizabeth to run away,” Michaela insisted in a whisper, but it was not low enough.
Alan shook his head and walked back to his horse.
“Is that what you think, Miss Fortune?” Harliss asked in an amused tone as she helped Elizabeth onto her saddle. She brushed her hands and then approached. Michaela stood tall, even when faced with the evil woman. “Perhaps you should ask Sir Hugh why he would suggest Lady Elizabeth ride her pony to the bridge with him, then, hmm? Perhaps it is not I who seeks to lure you from Cherbon, although it is true that I don’t think you deserve such a grand prize, either. Perhaps someone else, someone who has given you advice on your situation, seeks to rid himself of your presence for his own benefit, and thought to use your weakness for Elizabeth to his advantage?”
Michaela looked over at Hugh as Harliss stood face-to-face with her. Sir Hugh looked decidedly uncomfortable, and Michaela became furious.
“Hugh?” Michaela heard Roderick say, but her attention was brought back to Harliss, whispering in her face words meant for Michaela’s ears alone.
“I warned you not to trifle with me, Miss Fortune, and I am not finished with you, by far. With any of you,” she emphasized. “When you think to cross me again, remember this: cold water does not trouble me, and my arms are very, very strong.”
“You’re mad,” Michaela said, hearing the tremble in her own voice. The woman made absolutely no sense at all, and it was terrifying.
“Yes,” Harliss hissed with a smile. “Quite. You must be, to bear what I have in my life.”
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br /> Then she turned and was scrambling up onto her horse like a gray insect.
“Good day, Lord Cherbon, Lady Michaela,” Alan Tornfield said. “Again, I apologize for any trouble.”
“Think naught of it, Tornfield,” Roderick answered. “Of course you are all welcome to attend the wedding. Next week, likely. I’ll send word.” To Michaela’s ears, the invitation sounded like a goad.
Alan nodded stiffly and then turned his horse and led the members of his household back down the woodland road until they had all disappeared.
It was Roderick’s voice that stirred Michaela from her stare.
“See that Miss Fortune and Leo are returned to the keep safely, Hugh.” He looked to the sky and Michaela noticed it had gone cold, ash gray, the exact shade of Harliss’s eyes. “A storm comes on quickly and I have business to tend to.” Then he spurred his mount into a gallop and was gone.
Michaela let her eyes pin Hugh Gilbert, who held a now-sleeping Leo cradled in one elbow against his chest. “You brought her here, didn’t you? Elizabeth. For once, Harliss spoke true.”
“Don’t be silly,” Hugh scoffed. “And you haven’t been following my advice, obviously.”
“Obviously,” Michaela sneered as she gained her own mount with some difficulty. “If I had, I doubt I would be getting married in a matter of days, or that Roderick would be spending so much time with his son.”
Hugh looked as if Michaela had slapped him. “It’s a phase. It will pass. You don’t know him as I do.”
“You’re right, I don’t know him as you do. And I don’t think you know him at all.” Michaela nodded her head toward the road. “I’ll follow you.”
Hugh arched a sardonic eyebrow at her, but nudged his mount forward all the same. “This should be amusing,” he muttered.
“Oh, I doubt you find anything about it funny in the least.”
Chapter Twenty-One
Michaela was unwilling to let Hugh from her sight for even a moment, lest he try to cowardly escape from the discussion she was determined to have with him, and so she followed him to Leo’s small but lavish chamber and oversaw him placing the boy in his bed for a late nap. Beyond the boy’s room, thunder rumbled like a whispered promise of punishment yet to come, and Michaela knew Roderick was correct about the impending storm.
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