by Diane Gaston
Leo nodded. ‘Yes, it is.’
Rain would only make matters worse for Penny, Walker and the coachman. ‘I hope we find them before the rainfalls.’
Surely they’d walked at least three miles by now. You’d think they would have spied a village or a farmhouse, someplace where they could get help for Penny and Walker. They’d seen no buildings at all. They’d not even found the road. Mariel’s feet ached. She was tired and hungry and cold.
Just when she thought she could not feel any worse, the rain started. Fat drops, falling here and there, quickly thickened into teeming sheets of water and sent them running for the shelter of a tree.
‘Stay here,’ Leo said to her. ‘I’m going to run over the ridge to see if I can find shelter.
He sprinted away, not giving her an opportunity to stop him.
She started after him. ‘Leo! Wait!’
He acted as if he didn’t hear her, which was certainly possible in the roaring rain. He quickly disappeared from view. She abandoned the chase and made her way back to the tree to face the agony of not knowing where he was or if he would make it back to her.
The minutes seemed like hours and all her doubts and worries flooded her like the rains flooded the river. She wept for poor Penny, convinced the fall from the carriage had killed her. She also wept for Walker, and for the fledgling love budding between them.
Mariel also grieved the loss of all the hopes and dreams and delights that had accompanied her first romance—her only romance. She again let herself feel her love for Leo, her need of him.
She slid to the ground and buried her face in her hands, trying to stop herself weeping, trying to make herself strong and determined and self-reliant.
‘Mariel!’
She looked up. Leo emerged through the grey curtain of rain and strode towards her from the crest of the hill.
She wiped her face as she stood, then hurried to meet him.
He caught her in his arms. ‘I’ve found shelter!’
Pulling her arm through his, he led her up the hill and over another until she saw below them a small house. No signs of life around it, no smoke from its chimney, but it had a roof and, at the moment, that was more than enough.
They ran towards it, their feet slipping on the wet grass.
When they reached the door, though, it was padlocked.
‘I don’t suppose you have Walker’s keys with you?’ Mariel said, her voice catching on Walker’s name.
He smiled at her. ‘No, but I’m game to try one of your hairpins.’
She pulled one out and her hair tumbled down. She handed the hairpin to him. He inserted it in the lock and moved it carefully until, finally, the lock opened.
‘See, a hairpin can undo a lock,’ she commented. ‘I was not so foolish at Lord Kellford’s.’
His gaze pierced into her as he opened the door. ‘You were foolishly brave.’
They walked in.
The little house was dark and consisted of one large room with a table, three chairs, a fireplace and a cot. It smelled of dust and disuse, but it was dry.
‘It looks like a groundskeeper’s cottage,’ Leo said.
‘How long before the rain stops?’ she asked.
He glanced towards the window, rattling from the force of the rain. ‘I have no idea, but while we wait we should try to get warm.’
She could not argue. There was no use to keep going in the rain.
He walked over to the fireplace. ‘There is a stack of wood and a pail of coal.’ He immediately set about laying a fire.
Mariel spied a pump and went over to examine it. ‘It looks like there is water.’ She sighed. ‘Not that I wish to see any more water today.’ She tested the pump, but its pipe must have been filled with air.
She was suddenly thirsty, even after swallowing all that river water. She found a large jug and carried it to the door. ‘We’ll need water to prime the pump.’ She opened the door again and set the jug out in the rain. At the rate the rain was falling, it would be filled in no time at all.
Leo started a fire in the fireplace, no more than tinder burning at the moment, but a fire nonetheless.
Mariel walked towards it. ‘It will be lovely to be warm again.’
He stood and, suddenly, she felt the intimacy of being in this small space, in the darkness with him. The rain pattered on the cottage roof, but she fancied the sound of her beating heart rose above its din.
He glanced from the cot in the corner back to her, moving closer to her. His hazel eyes seemed to glow in the flame’s reflection. He touched her hair, a wet, tangled mass heavy on her shoulders.
Gently he combed it back with his fingers, his eyes on hers. ‘Mariel, you need to remove your clothes.’
Chapter Fourteen
‘Remove my clothes?’ Mariel pulled back.
He reached for her again, but withdrew his hands. ‘You are shivering. You’ll never get warm unless you get out of your clothes. Turn around. I’ll untie your laces.’
‘But...’ she protested.
‘You must. You’ll become ill if you don’t.’ He twirled his finger.
She knew he was right and did as she was told.
The knots had undoubtedly been made tighter by being wet. He struggled to undo them and she could smell the river on him. It brought back the terror of being pulled under the water over and over, fearing she would drown or, worse, she would watch Leo drown.
She trembled.
‘I will hurry,’ he said.
He finally undid the knot and loosened the lacings. Once she had dreamed of undressing for him on her wedding night. Never had she supposed the circumstances would be like this. She let her gown drop to the floor and she stepped out of it.
As soon as her dress was off, he started to work on the laces of her corset, a task Penny so often performed for her. Dear Penny, who took such pride in Mariel’s clothing and her appearance. Was she lying dead or injured in the cold rain? Mariel shook her head. She must not think about it.
Leo loosened her corset, which, like her dress, she let slip to the floor. He walked over to the cot and picked up one of the blankets that had been folded at its foot.
Holding it like a curtain around her, he said, ‘Take off your shift. You can wrap this around you.’
When her shift joined the other sodden clothing on the floor, he wrapped the blanket around her naked body like a cloak.
He dragged the cot close to the fire. ‘Sit here and I’ll take off your shoes and stockings.’
This seemed even more intimate than removing her corset. He rubbed her red and blistered feet to warm them, sending sensation shooting throughout her body. She forgot her chill, aroused now by his touch.
But as soon as he stopped she shivered, even under the blanket.
‘Lie down, Mariel. The fire will soon warm the place.’
She lowered her head onto the pillow and he stepped out of her sight. The sounds of his undressing made her wish to turn and watch him. He took a second blanket from the bed and she heard him wrap it around himself.
He climbed onto the cot and held her close against him. ‘Forgive me this liberty. It is the fastest way to take away your chill.’
This liberty? Her senses craved more than this liberty. She was not so green a girl that she did not know what she craved was the intimacy of a husband and wife. It immediately felt right to be enfolded in his arms, to feel his breath on her neck and the strength of his body next to hers.
‘I was thinking,’ he spoke quietly. ‘Chances are the post boy was unhurt. Surely he would have ridden to
get help. Or likely another carriage came by and found them. Perhaps at this very moment Penny and Walker and the coachman are warm and dry and well tended.’
It was the nicest thing he could have said to her. His words made perfect sense and, for the first time, gave her real hope. There were other people who would help Penny and Walker and the coachman. She could relieve herself of that responsibility and the guilt of failing at it. She could think of Penny, well fed and in clean nightclothes, safely tucked into a clean bed at a comfortable inn.
It helped her relax enough to close her eyes. She was so tired that even lying naked next to Leo, a mere blanket between them, was not enough to keep her awake.
It was enough that he held her, that they were together, that they were alive.
* * *
The surgeon stepped away from the bed and lowered his voice. ‘Nothing is broken. She has a nasty cut on her forehead, but that is all. I suspect tomorrow she’ll be right as rain.’ He glanced to the window where rain poured down as if from buckets. ‘Pardon the expression.’
Walker accompanied him to the bedchamber door and pressed a coin into his hand. ‘Thank you, sir.’
The post boy and the coachman, his head wrapped in a bandage, hovered in the inn’s hallway.
‘She will recover,’ Walker told them. ‘It is only a cut. Thank you both for your help.’ He shook their hands.
The post boy had ridden the team of horses to the next inn and sounded the alarm. They’d not had long to wait for help to arrive, but even that short period of time had been agony for Walker.
Miss Jenkins had been bleeding severely.
The accident had happened so fast. Suddenly the horses stumbled and the carriage lurched. With only a split second for decision, Walker grabbed hold of Miss Jenkins and jumped from the carriage at the moment it fell on its side. They landed in some bushes, barely escaping being crushed under the vehicle. They fell hard. Miss Jenkins’s head struck a rock and instantly blood poured down her beautiful face. He had gathered her into his arms as the carriage slid into the river and disappeared beneath the water, Fitz and Miss Covendale trapped inside.
Walker’s jaw flexed with emotion, but there was no time to grieve. Miss Jenkins needed him.
He bid good day to the two men who had shared the tragic experience and closed the door, returning to the bed where Miss Jenkins was propped up by pillows, tears rolling down her cheeks.
He sat in the chair next to her bed. ‘Did you hear that, miss? The surgeon says you will be well tomorrow. It is only a cut.’
‘I keep seeing the carriage.’ She wiped her eyes with her fingers. ‘My poor lady! What will I do without her?’
Walker glanced away. What would he do, as well? Fitz had given him his new life.
‘I don’t want to think of myself.’ Miss Jenkins sobbed. ‘It is so bad of me, but, without Miss Covendale, how will I ever get another position? There is no one to recommend me.’
Walker took her hand, still damp from her tears. ‘Do not upset yourself,’ he murmured. ‘These things have ways of coming to rights.’
If truth be told, he shared her worries. He’d depended upon Fitz to keep him from needing to return to his former life. He could not go back to that existence.
She looked up, her eyes glistening. ‘I should have stopped her from coming on this trip. She’d be alive if I did. I wish I had. She’d be alive then.’
He squeezed her hand. ‘That kind of thinking gets you nowhere. None of us possesses second sight. We could not know the coach would have an accident.’
Was it an accident? He’d seen nothing amiss on the road, but something elusive had caught the corner of his eye after they’d hit the ground. A man in the wood? He could not say for certain.
He turned his thoughts back to Miss Jenkins. ‘We were all merely trying to do something worthy. To help Miss Covendale.’ He’d thought Miss Covendale’s plight worthy of an Ann Radcliffe novel...if not for its tragic end.
Miss Jenkins nodded. ‘I did think I was helping her. That’s all I ever wanted to do.’
A bruise had formed beneath one of her eyes and a bandage was wrapped around her head, but she still was the loveliest woman Walker had ever seen.
He resisted the impulse to bring her hand to his lips. ‘You were devoted to her.’ As he’d been to Fitz. ‘Think. Would she want you to worry so? Do not worry over the future. You have me to help you.’
He would see that no harm came to her. He’d devote his life to the task if she’d allow him.
Her eyes widened, but he could say no more at this moment, at least about his feelings for her.
He swallowed. ‘You must think of what she would wish you to do. We must both think of what they would wish us to do.’
She blinked, but looked into his eyes again. ‘Do you think Lord Kellford will still ruin her father?’
He preferred this topic. ‘He might. Such men are spiteful.’ Kellford would certainly be enraged that his hopes for Miss Covendale’s fortune were dashed.
‘My lady would not like to see her family suffer. She is very devoted to her sisters.’ She broke down again. ‘I mean, she was devoted....’
Without thinking, he moved to sit beside her on the bed, wrapping his arms around her. ‘There, there,’ he soothed.
A dim memory glimmered. His long-lost mother had once held him in the same way. He shuddered. When was the last time he allowed himself such a memory of his mother? If grief over Fitz was nearly undoing him, what would happen if he gave in to his grief over his mother?
He forced his thoughts back to Miss Jenkins. ‘Would you like for us to still find this bank clerk? We might at least save Miss Covendale’s family from ruin.’
Her face glowed. ‘Could we? I would like that above all things.’
He could not help but smile. ‘That is what we will do, then. In the morning. If the rain ends, that is.’
She hugged him. ‘As soon as the rain ends!’
The trusting warmth of her arms almost loosed the tenuous hold he had on his emotions. His eyes stung with tears he refused to shed, but his heart wept in grief for the only two people in his life who had ever cared about him.
* * *
Leo had not intended to sleep, but the comforting sound of Mariel’s even breathing had lulled him. When he finally opened his eyes he had no idea how long he’d dozed. Rain still sounded on the roof and windowpanes, but it was dark outside. The only light in the room came from the fire in the grate, now burning low. It had done its task, though. The room was warm; his bone-cold chill had vanished.
Sometime during the night, Mariel had rolled over to face him. He gently tucked her blanket around her and simply gazed at her lovely face.
She looked relaxed and peaceful in sleep. Rather than a woman who’d nearly drowned, she resembled that little girl he’d once teased and taunted at Welbourne Manor. How he wished he could recapture those innocent days.
So much had happened in the meantime, so much disappointment and heartache. He’d hoped to atone for all she’d suffered by finding the bank clerk and freeing her of Kellford. Now he feared they would run out of time.
Tomorrow they must find a village and he must discover what happened to Walker and Penny. Would they have time to hire a new carriage to take them to Kellford’s hunting lodge, secure the bank clerk’s cooperation, and still return to London by the day Mariel was to be married? It was cutting it close to the quick.
What would happen then? Kellford would no doubt enact his revenge. Mariel’s father would be arrested and her family would be awash in scandal made even worse by Leo’s name being attached to it.
In that case, Leo would marry her, although he suspected that, like his parents’ own scandalbroth, the damage to Mariel’s reputation and that of her mother and sisters would be long-lasting.
Two things he could not guarantee for them: preserving Covendale’s life and preserving the family’s reputation. Those two things were the very reasons Mariel had agreed to marry Kellford in the first place. Would she feel any better being forced to marry him instead and still suffer the consequences she so wished to avoid?
He took a deep breath. Under no circumstances would he force her to marry him.
He sat up abruptly.
What he could do was give her the best of his efforts without requiring anything of her. No matter what, he would fight for Covendale’s life. No matter what, he would support Mariel and her family. No one would have to know the money came from him. And in two years’ time she would become an heiress and need no one’s help.
Mariel opened her eyes and rose on one elbow. ‘Leo? Is something amiss?’
His heart pounded in his chest. Even if he failed to stop Kellford, he could help her.
‘Nothing,’ he replied. ‘A thought. That is all.’
She gathered her blanket around her. His had slipped down to his waist.
‘About the accident?’ She rubbed her eyes.
‘No.’ He waved a hand. ‘It was nothing.’ It was everything to him, but nothing he need speak of right away.
She turned towards the window. ‘It’s dark and still raining.’
‘Indeed,’ he managed.
He stood, wrapping the blanket around his waist as he did so. He went to the fireplace and put more coal on the fire.
‘Are you thirsty?’ she asked. ‘I am very thirsty.’
He’d not thought about it, but he was both thirsty and hungry. ‘We could get the pump working.’
She rose from the cot. ‘I’ll go outside and fetch the jug I left out there. It should be full by now. Plenty of water to prime the pump.’
He intercepted her, touching her arm. ‘I’ll go. No need for you to get wet again.’ He crossed the room to the door, but turned back to her. ‘Look away, Mariel. I’m going to take off my blanket. To keep it dry.’