A Warriner to Rescue Her

by Virginia Heath

  ‘He’s slayed dragons?’

  ‘Of course. All of the best heroes have slayed dragons. I thought it would make the tale more exciting as well as being a good way to explain how you got your limp.’

  His square jaw hung slack for a moment. ‘Captain Galahad limps?’

  There were frequent moments in life when her silly mind and traitorous mouth got her into trouble. This was one of them. It was now blatantly obvious that she was writing fanciful prose about how much she admired his physique. Unless she could quickly weave some equally fanciful words which would convince him otherwise. ‘He was seriously wounded saving the kingdom from a dragon called Napoleon—but he rallied...obviously.’

  And now she was making it worse and glowing like a tomato, while he was staring at her in total bemusement. Cassie felt more hideous words bubble up and knew that if she didn’t take decisive action then she would babble more of the truth and look even more foolish. She avoided his eyes and began to read quickly, not daring to look back at him until she was certain he was engrossed in his painting again. Not long after that she ran out of words.

  ‘So that’s where I am up to.’

  He nodded with uninterest and continued to paint, so Cassie sat quietly and stared at the beautiful parkland and wondered if he would even notice if she tiptoed away. Usually, when she wasn’t being odd she had a talent for blending into the background. After what seemed like an age he sat back to admire his work, then one corner of his mouth curved up into an almost-smile. From her position, she could barely see the edge of the picture.

  ‘Can I see?’

  He shrugged and twisted his small easel around. She couldn’t quite believe what she saw. It was a scene from her story. Exactly as she imagined it in her mind’s eye. Only funnier. Captain Galahad, complete with rakish pirate earring, was stood at the base of a tree staring upwards with his hands on his hips. Two female feet were sticking out of the leaves and witty caricatures of Orange Blossom and Satan were stood side by side, watching the humans with complete astonishment. The colours were bold and the composition ideal for children to enjoy.

  ‘Oh, my goodness! It’s perfect. You have painted it exactly as I imagined it.’ It did not take a great deal of imagination to visualise a few lines of her prose written underneath the picture on a page. ‘I do believe your sister-in-law is correct. It would make a wonderful picture book. Now that I have seen this I want to see the rest of the story.’

  ‘I suppose I could cobble together one or two more.’

  He was frowning. Did that mean he was merely being polite in offering? ‘I do not want to inconvenience you, Captain Warriner.’

  Inconvenience him? It was not as if he really had anything else to do with his time. Jamie had thoroughly enjoyed creating the whimsical picture. He had also thoroughly enjoyed listening to Cassie read it to him. She did have a talent for comedy and the little children’s story definitely captured his interest.

  Initially he had been intent on painting the river, but once her voice transported him into her idealised, fairy-tale version of reality, the picture where he was the bravest of men who slayed dragons had practically drawn itself. The finished article amused him immensely and had also inspired him to finish the orchard painting as soon as he got home. Only now he knew that Miss Freckles would be falling towards him in a shower of apples while the two exaggerated horses looked on in alarm.

  Miss Reeves’s delighted reaction to it had thrilled him too. All at once he had felt useful again. Even if the something responsible was not particularly important in the grand scheme of things, it was important to her and at the very least his pointless talent for drawing had finally served a good purpose.

  ‘I wouldn’t have offered if it was an inconvenience, Miss Reeves.’

  In his head he had intended to say this with a charming smile. Adding, And perhaps you would care to meet me here again tomorrow so I can show you my efforts. However, it came out tinged with belligerence instead.

  ‘Be here tomorrow afternoon.’

  Her stunned expression quickly turned to amusement. ‘Yes, sir!’ Then she saluted him. ‘What time should I ready the troops for inspection?’

  Jamie felt himself smile. He could hardly blame her for poking fun at him because he deserved it. She was being nothing but friendly and his clumsy, curt remarks probably did make him appear horrendously stiff and humourless. To show her he really wasn’t, he flipped out his pocket watch. ‘Have them standing to attention at two on the dot, Corporal Reeves.’ He was rewarded with a grin that made the gold flecks in her eyes sparkle.

  ‘I was hoping to be a lieutenant at the very least.’

  ‘With hard work and discipline there is always the chance of promotion.’

  She leaned closer and nudged him in the arm playfully, giving Jamie a waft of her subtle perfume, then frowned as she caught a glimpse of the time. ‘Good gracious! I should be home by now. My father will be wondering where I am!’

  She jumped up and scurried down the bank to retrieve her horse, hastily stuffed her journal in the saddle bag and came towards him. ‘Would you mind helping me on to my saddle, Captain?’

  Of course he didn’t mind. It was an excuse to touch her again. Jamie tried to stand as gracefully as possible, which was impossible. When Miss Reeves thrust her hand out to help him he was mortified. Those little gestures of pity reminded him he was broken. ‘I can manage!’ If only his blasted leg hadn’t frozen solid.

  ‘Oh, for goodness sake, Captain Warriner, stop being so stubborn. I have happily asked for your help to get on my pony, so surely I can return the favour?’ She saw him set his jaw, offended, and rolled her eyes. ‘What did you say to me in the tree?’ She mocked his deep voice again. ‘“Take my hand!” Or are you too proud?’

  Reluctantly, he did and she hauled him to his feet, then went about the business of organising her pretty pony’s reins. Jamie limped towards her and was about to cup his hands to boost her into the seat as she had asked, when the urge to show her he was still a man asserted itself. Damn over-familiarity or impropriety! He might well need assistance getting up, but once he was up he was still as strong as an ox and capable of doing all of those things everyone thought he couldn’t. He slid his hands around her waist deliberately, pulling her gently towards him, then lifted her off the ground. He softly deposited her on her side saddle and then, as he had the first time, he eased her feet into the stirrups. Only this time his fingers lingered longer on her ankles, feeling oddly privileged to know that under her proper vicar’s daughter skirts she enjoyed the whisper of silk against her skin. If he slid his hand a few inches upwards, he was certain he would find those incongruous, naughty garters that in all probability only he knew about.

  She stared down at him oddly and he knew he had overstepped the mark. ‘I really must get home, Captain Warriner.’

  Jamie released his hold on her ankle and patted the haunch of her pony. ‘Until tomorrow, Miss Reeves.’ She blinked twice, then snapped the reins. Quick as a flash, she and her delightful freckles were gone.

  * * *

  ‘Where have you been, girl?’ Her father stood in the kitchen, his face already contorted with anger.

  Cassie chided herself for being so careless as to lose track of time. Her father was a man of strict routines. She might not exist to him for most of the day, but the times he remembered her were chiselled indelibly in stone. Four o’clock he expected a hot meal on the table and a pair of ears to listen to him practise his sermon.

  She and Orange Blossom had galloped home, slowing only when they turned into the lane which led towards the vicarage. If he had witnessed her riding with abandon he would forbid her from riding and sell her little pony to the slaughter man, exactly as he had threatened. The Reverend Reeves never made idle threats when it came to disciplining his wayward daughter and Orange Blossom had been her only fr
iend in the world for so long her father knew exactly how to hurt her.

  For her own good, of course. Always for her own good lest she turn into her mother. Her eyes darted to the clock on the mantel. She was only ten minutes late—yet in less time he had been known to work himself into such a temper he was practically delirious with it. She would have to tread carefully.

  ‘I was talking to some of your new parishioners in the village, Papa. Listening to their ills and offering comfort. Those duties kept me a trifle longer than I wished.’ Cassie headed quickly to the fire to see to the bubbling stew she had placed there earlier. It gave her an excuse not to meet his eyes or to allow him to see she was fibbing. Instinctively her eyes flicked quickly to the door. The key was in the lock. A good sign.

  ‘Liar! I saw you as you rode down the lane. You were smiling!’

  ‘The weather is beautiful, Papa, and Retford is such a lovely village I cannot help smiling at all of God’s creation.’

  ‘You went to meet a lover, didn’t you, Cassandra? A clandestine meeting with a man! Did you disgrace yourself like your mother, girl?’

  Instantly, every muscle in Cassie’s body tensed while she forced herself to appear normal. She had been having a clandestine meeting with a man, of sorts, so her father’s accusation was dangerously close to the mark. Only the illusion of calmness would help alleviate his fears and placate him so she tried to centre herself as she grabbed a cloth, wrapped it around the handle of the pot and carefully carried the steaming vessel to the table. Sometimes, gentle calm worked.

  ‘I saw Mrs Sansam in the village today, Papa. She told me to tell you that she very much enjoyed your sermon last Sunday.’

  Sticking to the truth, finding things he could easily confirm when he went searching for sign of her sins, was always best. Mrs Sansam, with her bushel of lively children, was always so busy keeping them on a tight leash Cassie reasoned she would have little concept of time. The fact that they had spoken in the early afternoon rather than just now would hardly register if her father questioned the woman tomorrow. Despite his claims of vanity being the most dreadful of sins, her father adored getting praise for his sermons. The tiny compliment was already softening the tension around his jaw.

  ‘Mrs Sansam is a good woman. Godly. She does this parish credit.’ People who fell into line were always a credit. Rebellious traits, like imagination or humour, were evidence of ingrained sin caused by ungodly wilfulness, so Cassie hid those parts of her character in his presence, pouring them all into her stories instead.

  ‘I have offered to watch her youngest two children tomorrow, to give her some peace.’

  ‘Peace? Nonsense. Children are a blessing from the Lord, Cassandra.’

  Funny, she was his child and had never felt like a blessing—more of a curse left to him by her mother when she had made her dash for freedom. As the years had passed, Cassie had developed some empathy for the strange woman she did not remember, yet who kindled her father’s daily wrath. To remain shackled to him till death was tantamount to torture. Like her faceless mother, Cassie had the dream of escaping one day. For years she had assumed that would happen when a nice man offered to marry her. However, for that miraculous event to happen she would need to stay in one place for enough time to actually meet a nice man in the first place. Something, thanks to her father, much easier said than done.

  Older and wiser, Cassie now realised how dreadful her life might be if she married the wrong man in haste. If she found one with any of the same traits of her overbearing father, then all she would be doing was jumping out of the frying pan and diving into the fire. What she wanted for herself was a pleasant life where she did not have to continually pretend to be something she was not, which meant setting up on her own somewhere. Hence she had begun to squirrel away every spare farthing—aside from those she had spent on a few fripperies she could not resist.

  ‘You are right, as always, Papa.’ His mind was moving on, she could tell. The mask of fury was being replaced by the dour expression of a man who believed he was listened to. ‘I also thought I would take a small basket to the elderly couple we met last week—you know the ones. The husband is blind. It must be very difficult for his wife to leave him alone to go to the market.’

  Cassie tried not to let the palpable relief show as her father sat down at the table. He never sat when he was angry, so the brief, sharp fury she had witnessed upon her arrival must already be dissolving. He believed her.

  This time.

  Although who knew if she would be so lucky next time. Although she had never gambled—because gambling was a heinous sin—she had often thought gauging her father’s mood would be a great deal like playing hazard. One never knew how the dice would fall and she never knew what might send him into a rage.

  ‘Whilst it is to be commended that you pity those unfortunate souls, Cassandra, and fitting that you should offer them some charity, as I have taught you, try to remember the Lord took that man’s sight for a reason. Perhaps he was a sinner and to live for evermore in darkness was his penance.’

  Hogwash. But her father put a great deal of stock in the concept of penance.

  ‘Yes, Papa.’ She ladled the rich stew into his bowl and then did the same to her own. After her father said grace they ate in silence. The Reverend Reeves believed meal times were for quiet contemplation rather than social discourse. When he’d finished, he sat back to watch Cassie clear away the table. Only then did he retrieve his latest sermon from his study to read to her as she washed the dishes.

  As was expected, she listened in silence. Except she wasn’t listening. The drone of his voice was easily shut out while she weaved the fanciful stories in her head. And thanks to Captain Warriner’s wonderful illustration and desire to create more for her never-to-be-published book of children’s stories, she now had a greater incentive to think about her characters than ever before. She couldn’t wait until bedtime in order to write the next instalment. In it she would have to find a way to convey Miss Freckles flattening the handsome pirate when they fell out of the tree without alluding to the scandalously splendid pleasure of being in such close, intimate proximity to such a fine figure of a man. Captain Warriner had such strong arms...

  ‘The Warriner family have long been an evil stain in this parish!’

  Her head snapped up at the sound of her father’s fervent, practised tone.

  ‘The previous Earl was a drunkard and a cheat, swindling many of you out of money and worse. Now his sons are a plague. An infestation of vileness without shame or conscience. Only recently, the new Earl kidnapped his bride and forced her into marriage. Under your noses he kept her prisoner in that den of iniquity—one lone, terrified woman in a house occupied by four vile men. Four soldiers of the Devil himself. Despoilers. Debauchers. Fornicators!’

  Her stomach clenched as Cassie listened to more of his outrageous vitriol. Grossly unfair words which her father would have honed and rehearsed before he delivered his sermon in a few days. Words which would find their way back to Markham Manor and wound the people within. The good people within. So far she had met only three Warriners and knew they were good people in the same way you could smell a storm in the air. It was a gut feeling. And now, after all the trouble she had already caused him, Cassie would have to apologise to James Warriner once again. She only hoped he meant what he had said to her under the stars last night and that he would not judge her by the sins of her father.

  Chapter Seven

  Jamie had painted well into the night like a man possessed. Or besotted. Miss Freckles had quite got under his skin. Both the real one and the fictional. Now his saddle bag was stuffed with two more colourful illustrations from the start of the tale, as well as the finished orchard painting which was no longer a view of the sky through the trees from the floor. Miss Freckles was hurtling towards the ground, arms and legs waving frantically in the air, b
ig brown eyes wide with alarm and her lovely gingersnap hair in disarray. For good measure, he had added the leaves and twigs to her hairstyle he had found so becoming. He had been tempted to also show a hint of the saucy pink garter, but decided against it on two counts. One, such things were hardly appropriate for the eyes of children and, two, he did not wish to enlighten the vicar’s daughter to the fact that he was secretly lusting after her. Jamie sincerely doubted she would be thrilled with the latter.

  Horrified more like—yet achingly polite lest she inadvertently insulted a cripple. He would prefer to walk on hot coals before he witnessed that—or limp on hot coals, which was probably more fitting. The most tragic thing about the whole situation was the limp was merely the tip of the iceberg. There was a whole hornets’ nest of other issues which he would rather never have to admit to. Ugly scars down his left thigh and above the left hip. The unsightly muscle wastage which came from the infirmity. Those were not things he would want to show a lady.

  But even if he did find a woman who could overlook such distasteful physical flaws, because they might not be so obvious if he insisted on making love to the poor thing in the dark, then there was the fact that he was terrified of the dark and therefore prone to react in a manner which shamed and frightened him in equal measure. The fear paralysed him and took away all reason, then he would lash out. Unless he had a pistol in his hand and a light on somewhere close by. Or a big, fat full moon to illuminate the sky. He could cope with it then. Just about. However, even the most forgiving of women would find the prospect of making love to a man with a pistol clutched in one hand, just in case his father or Capitaine DuFour miraculously rose from the dead to come and beat him senseless again, petrifying.

  Then there was also the disturbing habit of his trying to attack anyone who tried to wake him up. Granted, he had only done it the once but, as he had almost strangled the life out of his brother Jacob in the process, it had been a memorable event. Significantly memorable enough to mean that nobody ventured into his bedchamber unannounced while he slept and Jamie certainly could not entertain the notion of ever sharing his bed with another. Not when he had hands strong enough to snap a neck in two. It had taken less than a few minutes to send DuFour to his maker and the sadistic Frenchman had been in possession of a thick and meaty neck. Very definitely a man’s neck. A delicate female throat would snap like a dry twig in summer before Jamie had remembered blasted DuFour and his damned father were already dead.