Betrothed

by Alyssia Kirkhart

  “People do it every day.”

  “We are not most people, Cav.”

  He paused contemplatively. Let out a shallow breath. “No. I suppose we are not.”

  “I know when you marry,” she said, and placed a hand on his arm, “you’ll wish it to be for love. And that is commendable, Cav, don’t you see? Think of all the happiness we shall miss should we marry and attempt to make a life without that kind of love. The kind that burns so deep inside--” she laid her hand upon his chest, directly over his heart “--it is all-consuming.”

  Cav took her hand in his, brought it to his lips. “You love him, then,” he murmured and at her slow, yet sure nod, “Then you should know that he loves you.”

  “He told you this?”

  “He did not have to. A man simply knows these things. Trust me.”

  Silence ensued as they stood inert, both, perhaps, searching for the right words to say. Sara, looking up to Cav with all the admiration of a sister peering up at her big brother; Cav, studying Sara’s hand, as if it was the last time he’d ever see the delicacy of a woman’s fingers.

  “Cav?” she finally said, breaking the silence.

  “Hmm?” he murmured absently, rubbing the pad of his thumb in slow circles over her cuticles.

  “I must go to him.” His gaze met hers. “I have to tell him. He needs to know how I feel.”

  Reluctance swam in his intense green eyes. Sara knew he still wasn’t convinced, yet she couldn’t fault him for it. For years, it had been the two of them, and it only seemed natural that, had she been able to shirk her marriage contract, she would marry Cav.

  “You are my dearest friend, Cav, do you realize that?”

  “Yes, I do.” He pressed a kiss to her knuckles, tapped a fingertip to her nose. “No one else could tolerate your brazenness as I have for all these years unless they were, as you say, a dear friend.”

  Sara rolled her eyes upward, as if to weigh the suggestion. “Hmm ...” She set a finger to the corner of her mouth. “So this is why I’ve very few friends.”

  Cav chuckled at that, and she, with him.

  “Where do you think he went to?” he asked after a few moments. “Hopefully not out.” He turned his gaze to the window, upon which the rain pelted angrily. “’Tis death out there, for certain.”

  “I do not know,” she replied honestly, feeling nervous all over again. The hurt she’d witnessed brewing in Justin’s deep brown eyes was devastating.

  “Where would you go, Cav?”

  “Me?”

  “Yes, of course. You are a man.”

  “Last I checked,” he affirmed, smiling crookedly.

  Sara cocked her head to the side. “You know what I mean. What would a man do in this situation? Where would he go?”

  Cav dragged a slow hand through his hair. “Out. I couldn’t stay in this house knowing you were here. Knowing I just witnessed another man proposing to you,” he added, gazing down at her, eyebrow arched.

  “Out,” she repeated. “As in …” She looked to the rain-streaked window.

  “When a man’s heart is broken, my dear,” he said gently, “neither rain nor sleet nor snow can keep him from breaking free of whatever has caused him pain. I suspect, given his obvious skills in horsemanship, he is heading for the stables.” He shrugged and muttered, “That is what I would do.”

  Sara thought about that for a moment. Releasing a quick, determined breath, she said, “Very well, then. To the stables, it is.” She marched for the door.

  “Sara, you cannot be serious.” Desperation hung in Cav’s tone, his steps, as he strode after her. “You cannot possibly think it prudent to go out there, in the pouring rain. You’ll be ill. You’ll--”

  “I do not care!” she said, whirling on him. “Rain, sleet, snow. I cannot let him go like this.”

  Slowly, slowly, Cav nodded his understanding. “At least allow me to escort you to the door.” He proffered his arm, and Sara slipped her hand inside. “That way I can send a servant for my great coat. You should try to preserve something of your dignity, dressed as you are.”

  “Thank you, Cav.” They advanced down the path of hallways leading to the main entrance. “Truly, I hadn’t meant to venture out tonight, but--”

  “He sent for you.”

  She looked up at him, even as he kept his gaze straight ahead. “How did you ...?”

  “A man knows these things, love. I may have proposed to you …” He stopped in the foyer and beseeched a footman to fetch his great coat. “But I also knew Carrington, ah, Tethersal, pardon, was desperate to do the same. It was only a matter of time before he summoned you. I am only surprised he had the patience to wait it out while you were hiding out in your room.”

  “I was not hiding.”

  Cav took his heavy, woolen cloak from the footman, nodded his thanks, and draped the material around Sara’s body. The soothing combination of spice and fresh-cut green grass enveloped her.

  “You needn’t lie about it.” He settled the hood over her head. “Give some credit to the man who watched you, as a lass of fourteen, hide because the cook was serving Brussels sprouts with lamb chops.”

  Sara made a face at the memory. “It’s unnatural for cabbages to be that small.”

  Cav only chuckled and motioned for a footman to open the door. A rush of wind and rain swept through, stealing Sara’s breath. It was dark, cold. Even through the layers of cloth covering her body, the chill in the air cut to the bone. Her heartbeat accelerated.

  Justin was out in this.

  She had to find him.

  “Be careful, Sara.” Cav pressed her hand, brought it to his lips, and placed a firm kiss to her knuckles. “If something were to happen to you …”

  “I know.” She laid a hand upon his cheek, feeling her own cheeks flush when he turned his head to press a kiss to her palm.

  He would have been good to her, Cav would’ve. But this urgent love she had for Justin was so strong, so powerful, that whatever life she may have tried to make with Cav--and try, she would have; for the sake of her children; for the sake of the value she put on honoring one’s husband--would have suffered.

  “Go,” he urged, applying gentle pressure to the small of her back as he coaxed her across the threshold. “Before the rain worsens. Before I change my mind about standing aside while you do this.”

  Blinking back the dampness from her eyelashes Sara stepped out onto the stone terrace. A clasp of thunder quaked the surrounding earth. Lightning, reaching as thin, hoary fingers, crackled across the night sky. In the midst of the front lawn, the trees and shrubbery smarted against the continuous pelting of the rain.

  Sara drew the hood of Cav’s cloak tighter around her face and tread forward, wishing she’d thought to wear shoes. Her feet were freezing. The walk to the stables would be difficult, not to mention she wasn’t certain Justin had gone in that direction. But then again, it was as good a start as any. She could saddle a horse easily enough, could ride bareback if she had to, as Father had taught her as a child. Only where she would go once she had a horse, she did not know.

  She looked over her shoulder, to the safety of the house where Cav still stood in the open doorway, wondering if she should turn back. If she should let this go and pray Justin returned in time to--

  Sara froze. The unmistakable sound of hooves, tearing and sloshing across saturated earth, stole through her thoughts. A whip cracked, and she gasped. The low drumming drew nearer, faster. Sara rushed to the stone rail of the steps and leaned over, peered into the distance.

  In seconds the figure of a man on horseback came thundering out of the darkness. Sara’s breath caught hard in her throat. Her heart slammed reactively against her ribs. Justin. Justin.

  Without thought, she leaned further over the railing, the stone digging painfully into her abdomen. “Justin!” she screamed, but he galloped past without one glance in her direction.

  Sara barreled down the steps, shivering against the frigid rain as Cav�
��s heavy cloak flew off her shoulders. She would not go back. Even when her teeth began to chatter, and her skin, practically bare to the unyielding elements, prickled with gooseflesh, she refused.

  She had to stop him.

  “Justin, please!” she shouted, though she was almost positive he could not hear her. The rain was coming in heavy sheets now, soaking her clothes, her hair. “Please! Stop! Stop!”

  By some miracle of God, because in all reality it couldn’t have been anything but, Justin’s mount skidded to a halt.

  Sara blinked several times, watched through glazed eyes as Justin’s entire upper body went rigid. His shoulders squared; his back stiffened. When his head turned, giving her a blurred view of his sharp features, Sara swore her heart was on the brink of ripping in two.

  He had to turn around. He just had to.

  “Justin.” Sara trembled as, stepping from the last stone step, her bare feet sank into the ground. “Please turn around.” The words passed as little more than a whisper. “Please look back at me.”

  The mount spun then, rear hooves pivoting with a grace commanded by only the most skilled of horsemen, and cantered toward her.

  Sara remained static, stunned with equal parts fear and relief. Fear for the anger visible in the hooded set of his dark eyes as he brought his mount to an abrupt stop before her. Relief for the knowledge that evidently he wasn’t too far gone; that her pleas had not been in vain.

  That maybe she wasn’t too late.

  For a moment he simply stared down at her, his features hard, his dark hair plastered to his head. His cambric shirt, the only article of clothing he wore save for his dark breeches and riding boots, was soaked. He was as vulnerable as a man of his station could be, yet unequivocally terrifying.

  Sara wrapped her arms around herself. As if that would protect her from this ominous male who, at present, appeared more a ruthless highwayman than a duke. Shuddering, she tried to step back, but her feet were immobile, frozen.

  She looked down. Maybe she could will them to--

  A large hand, bronzed by the sun, soaked by the plaguing rain, appeared before her eyes. Sara looked up into Justin’s hard features questionably, but he said nothing. Only held out his hand, palm facing up, in blatant invitation.

  She could still turn back. Cav would send for dry clothing, have a fire stoked, a pot of tea made. In three days she’d be back in Ireland, her home, the land she loved, where she could spend the remainder of her life in quiet spinsterhood. Comfortable. Unhappy, maybe. But only for a little while. Until she found some way to cut Justin from her heart. From her soul.

  Who was she fooling?

  Fingers trembling so violently they appeared as foreign objects, Sara slipped her hand inside Justin’s, and gasped as his fingers closed, vice-like, around hers. Before she could think to ask how this was going to work (for she assumed he meant to give her aid in settling to the space behind him), Sara felt herself being hauled upward and planted between the horse’s neck and Justin’s hard body. His arm came around her, protectively.

  “Hold steady,” he murmured into her ear, and Sara felt an instant rush of warmth consume her shaking limbs.

  Wrapping her arms around his waist, she turned into him, pressed her cheek against his chest. There, she clung, not knowing where they were going or if she even wanted to know. Justin hadn’t abandoned her. Hope remained, and Sara intended to hold onto it with all she had.

  And so she tightened her arms around him, buried her face into the saturated folds of his gleaming white shirt, where underneath his skin laid hot and smooth. He smelled wonderful. She felt his heart, beating rapidly against her own skin. The arresting male power that was his arm, fastened solidly around her waist.

  Unable to stop herself, Sara brushed her lips to his chest, and allowed herself a wicked little smile when he inhaled sharply. Another tentative kiss to his chest, another to the hollow beneath his Adam’s apple. Deep, rumbling groans stirred in his upper body, vibrated against her lips like the predatory purrs of a jungle cat.

  “Don’t,” she heard him growl. His hand fanned, clamped down onto her hip.

  “Don’t ... what?” She touched the tip of her tongue to his burning skin, remembering fondly when those very words had been asked of her. By him. When he was the seducer, and she, the dumbfounded innocent.

  But that was the old Sara. This ... wanton version of herself wanted to touch, kiss, and feel. To experience what she’d only overheard in the hush-hush conversations among married women and the female servants in her father’s household.

  Daringly she licked the fascinating curvature that was his neck sloping into his collar bone, tasting salt and earth and--

  “Confound it, woman!” His hands clasped onto her shoulders, wrenched her from his body.

  Sara’s lips parted in shock, her hands flying reactively to push against his chest. They’d stopped--she hadn’t even noticed a change in the horse’s gait. Over Justin’s shoulder stood the hallowed structure of a thatched roof cottage with stone walls. If not for the well-trimmed shrubbery surrounding the place, she might have thought it abandoned, ancient as it appeared.

  “Where are we?”

  “Gamekeeper’s cottage.” He slid to the ground, his boots sinking into the sopping mud. “Abandoned.”

  “It does not appear abandoned.” She brought a hand to her brow, shading her eyes from the rain.

  “I keep up the place. Here.” He reached for her, and she complied, taking a firm hold on his shoulders as, hooking an arm beneath her knees, he pulled her down and cradled her against his chest.

  “I can walk,” she said, even as her arms looped themselves around his neck. She felt inexplicably tiny, swathed in his embrace as if she were no more than a small child.

  “Your bare feet say different,” he murmured, and trudged toward the cottage. “I cannot believe you ran out in the rain. What were you thinking?”

  “I wasn’t.”

  “Clearly. Can you reach the knob?” he asked as they approached the front door. Made of aged wood with a small, iron-latticed window and lion’s head knocker, it made Sara think of castles rather than solitary cottages.

  “I think so.” Leaving one arm curled around his neck, she reached down and turned the cold iron knob until it clicked.

  Justin kicked the door open and stepped inside, pausing long enough for Sara to shut the door behind them before he deposited her on a wooden stool.

  “I have to tend to the gelding.”

  Sara gaped up at him, dazed.

  “Can you start a fire?”

  “I ...”

  “Never mind.” He turned for the door. “I’ll do it when I return. There are blankets in the chest at the foot of the bed.” He flicked a wrist toward the small four-poster on the other side of the room. “I’d advise you find one and get yourself warm.”

  “When will you be back?”

  “Shortly.” He walked out, slamming the door behind him.

  “Shortly,” she echoed softly, looking around. At least he wasn’t going to leave her here, stranded and freezing. Actually she could start a fire. If he’d given her the chance to answer, he might’ve learned that about her. Then again he was angry, and waiting while she stuttered over straightforward questions was likely too much to ask.

  With an exasperated sigh, Sara got up and took a quick assessment of the cottage. It was reasonably large, though it consisted of only the one room with naught but a few meager furnishings. There was the bed, clean and inviting considering the frigid state of her limbs. An old roll-top desk with pen, ink and parchment against one wall; a rustic oak armoire against another; a woven floor covering with archaic foliage and frayed edges in the center; and of course the three-legged stool, next to the fireplace, on which Justin had plopped her mere moments ago.

  Perhaps she’d better start with the fireplace.

  Locating a neat pile of dry wood resting beside the hearth, Sara heaved a couple of the smaller logs into her arms and thr
ew them into the grate. Thankfully the gamekeeper--or former gamekeeper, as it were--saw fit to leave behind his matches and a few tallow candles. Sara grabbed one of each and set to work igniting a flame.

  She forced herself not to turn around when the door creaked open and shut, this time with a bit more ease.

  “You started a fire.”

  Sara wanted to laugh. “You sound surprised.”

  “A little.” The echo of his slow stroll as he moved toward her was both chilling and exciting, and Sara felt a tiny shiver of joy race up her spine at the thought of having impressed him. “Where did you learn to do that?” he asked, sinking to his knees beside her.

  “My father taught me.” She stoked the fire carefully, watching with satisfaction as, little by little, the flames grew into vibrant peaks of orange and yellow.

  “It appears as though your father taught you a great deal uncharacteristic in the upbringing of a young lady.”

  It was the most he had said since yanking her up into the saddle with him.

  “I suppose you could say that. We Irish weren’t built to be all frills and lace, you know. Our intelligence means too much to degrade ourselves by not using it.”

  “I would think no less of you.” The warm glow of the fire bathed his handsome features in shades of amber and orange, adding to his dark eyes a fervor she could not explain. He smiled at her, only the faintest curve of his lips, but it put a stutter in her reply all the same.

  “I-I ... that is ...” She tore her gaze from his and focused on her hands, folded neatly in her lap. Making sense of anything was impossible when he looked at her that way. “Thank you.”

  He said nothing, but rose to settle onto the hearth, where he began tugging off his muddy boots, followed by his woolen stockings.

  Sara sat in silence, and stared from the corner of her eye. His breeches were soaked, dirty, ripped in one place directly above his knee. His shirt was ruined. Not that it mattered. He could buy a hundred more to replace it.

  But what fascinated her more than the disheveled state of his clothing was the length of skin from his knee to the very tips of his toes. Bronzed and covered in soft dark hair, his calves were lean yet muscular. His feet were smooth and chiseled and so much larger than her own. On each of his toes, the nails of which were clean and well-groomed, was the lightest dusting of hair. It suddenly occurred to Sara that she’d never seen the toes of a man, had never even thought to wonder about such things. But there it was.