Swain raised her mallet high, intending this time to do more than break Trey’s hand. But he was ready. He jumped away and grabbed the mallet as it whistled past his head, yanking her from the saddle.
She struggled, but Trey was heavier and she had little strength left. He ground his knee into her wounded shoulder. She couldn’t breathe with his weight settled on her chest. Her vision faded and cleared in waves, giving her only glimpses of his sneering face close to hers. She felt the cold steel of his gun against her cheek as he struggled to hold it in his mangled hand.
She’d failed. She only hoped Lillie could forgive her.
The darkness closed in just as the loud report of a gun echoed across the field.
Chapter Thirty-Four
Swain blinked several times, trying to find purchase in the unfamiliar surroundings.
“There you are.”
She struggled to home in on the soft voice. Blinking again, she was able to focus on several bags of fluids hanging on a steel pole next to the bed she was lying in. A cool hand caressed her cheek and she looked into the worried eyes hovering over her.
Swain opened her mouth to speak, but her tongue felt glued to the roof of her mouth and her throat too dry and sore to swallow.
“Just a minute, love, let me get you a sip of water.”
She watched Lillie fill a cup with ice water. She was so tired and her shoulder throbbed. She closed her eyes again until a straw touched her lips and she sucked greedily.
“Easy, darling. Just a little at a time until we see how your stomach will tolerate it.”
“Lillie.” Her voice was a hoarse croak.
“Yes, love. I’m here. Everything’s going to be fine.” Lillie’s cheek was bruised and swollen.
Swain’s eyes filled with tears. “He hurt you,” she choked out.
Lillie’s fingers were gentle as they wiped away the tears trickling into Swain’s ears. “Not anymore, darling. He can’t hurt either of us again.” Her eyes were sad. “Hopefully, he’s free from his own pain, too.”
Swain closed her eyes, flashes of Trey dragging Lillie toward the house beginning to surface. “I didn’t keep you safe.”
“Oh, but you did, love. You were wounded and bleeding, but you still managed to climb on that horse and ride to my rescue.”
The image of Trey pointing his gun at Lillie’s back flashed before her and Swain gasped. “He was going to shoot you.”
“But he didn’t. You knocked the gun from his hand. Then when you came back at him, he pulled you from the saddle.” Lillie’s hand found hers and held it tight while her other stroked Swain’s face and shoulders, as if reassuring herself Swain wasn’t just a vision. “My champion. I was so scared for you.”
“I can only remember parts of it.”
“Trey’s hand was broken when you hit it with the mallet, so he was having trouble picking up the gun. He intended to shoot you, but Mr. Whitney shot him first.”
“Bonner?”
“He knew Abigail didn’t believe my parents’ deaths were accidents. So, when he received a copy of Trey’s DNA report for the probate hearing, he faxed it to the inspector who had investigated their deaths. It matched the skin scrapings found under my father’s fingernails. He came to the house to tell us, but no one answered the bell. So he walked around to the terrace in time to see Trey hit me. He remembered Grandmum kept a gun in her desk, so he ran to get it. Trey had pulled you to the ground and I was running back to you when Mr. Whitney yelled at me to get down and he fired.”
“Trey?”
“I’m afraid he didn’t make it.”
Her brother was dead. She would be truly alone in the world if she didn’t have Lillie. Would Lillie go now, back to England, to the life she had before? Swain was quiet as Lillie stroked her hair.
“You’re sweating, darling. Are you in pain?”
“Yeah, a little. What time is it?”
“Eight in the morning. They took you to surgery, and you’ve been sleeping all night. They brought a breakfast tray, but it’s little more than gelatin and broth.”
Swain made a face. “How long do I have to stay here?”
“A couple of days, the doctor said. You lost a lot of blood.”
“I want to go home.” Home to her ponies. But would they be enough without Lillie?
“I know, love, but you have to do what the doctor says. Mary promised to bring something to eat as soon as you can have solid food.”
Swain shifted in the bed, picking at the sheet and avoiding Lillie’s gaze. “What are you going to do?”
Lillie lifted Swain’s hand to her lips. “Stay right here until the doctor releases you. Then, I intend to take you home and nurse you back to health.” She winked. “I’ve got lots of plans for this gorgeous body when it’s all healed.”
Swain closed her eyes. It was almost too much to hope for, to have Lillie in her arms forever. “You’re not going to leave me?” She opened her eyes, pleading. “You can still spend time in England part of the year. I’ll go with you. But you’ve made friends here. You may not be born to it, but your name is still Wetherington.”
Lillie’s gaze was soft as she caressed Swain’s cheek.
“My darling Swain, don’t you see? My destiny was never to be a Wetherington, but to love one. You are a Wetherington whether you take the name or not. It’s that true heart of yours, not the ponies, that are meant for me. You’ve made it impossible for me to leave. I’ve fallen in love with you.”
“I love you, too, Lillie. I’ll always love you. If you don’t want to live here, I’ll follow you back to England or wherever you want to live.”
“I don’t want to be anywhere, love, but here with you and your ponies. Always.”
About the Author
D. Jackson Leigh grew up barefoot and happy, swimming in farm ponds and riding rude ponies in rural south Georgia.
Her love of reading was nurtured early on by her grandmother, an English teacher who patiently taught her to work New York Times crossword puzzles in the daily paper, and by her mother, who stretched the slim family budget to bring home grocery store copies of Trixie Belden mysteries and Bobbsey Twins adventures that Jackson would sit up all night reading.
It was her passion for writing that led her quite accidentally to a career in journalism and, ultimately, North Carolina, where she now feeds nightly off the adrenaline rush of breaking news and close deadlines.
She shares her life with her blue-eyed partner, a very wise Jack Russell Terrier, and “the cat” who made herself at home when Jackson and the dog weren’t watchful.
Visit Jackson at djacksonleigh.com or facebook.com/djacksonleigh.
Books Available From Bold Strokes Books
True Confessions by PJ Trebelhorn. Lynn Patrick finally has a chance with the only woman she’s ever loved, her lifelong friend Jessica Greenfield, but Jessie is still tormented by an abusive past. (978-1- 60282-216-0)
Jane Doe by Lisa Girolami. On a getaway trip to Las Vegas, Emily Carver gambles on a chance for true love and discovers that sometimes in order to find yourself, you have to start from scratch. (978-1-60282- 217-7)
Ghosts of Winter by Rebecca S. Buck. Can Ros Wynne, who has lost everything she thought defined her, find her true life—and her true love—surrounded by the lingering history of the once-grand Winter Manor? (978-1-60282-219-1)
Who I Am by M.L. Rice. Devin Kelly’s senior year is a disaster. She’s in a new school in a new town, and the school bully is making her life miserable—but then she meets his sister Melanie and realizes her feelings for her are more than platonic. (978-1-60282-231-3)
Call Me Softly by D. Jackson Leigh. Polo pony trainer Swain Butler finds that neither her heart nor her secret are safe when beautiful British heiress Lillie Wetherington arrives to bury her grandmother, Swain’s employer. (978-1-60282-215-3)
Split by Mel Bossa. Weeks before Derek O’Reilly’s engagement party, a chance meeting with Nick Lund, his teenage first love, catapults him int
o the past, where he relives that powerful relationship revealing what he and Nick were, still are, and might yet be to each other. (978- 1-60282-220-7)
Blood Hunt by LL Raand. In the second Midnight Hunters Novel, Detective Jody Gates, heir to a powerful Vampire clan, forges an uneasy alliance with Sylvan, the Wolf Were Alpha, to battle a shadow army of humans and rogue Weres, while fighting her growing hunger for human reporter Becca Land. (978-1-60282-209-2)
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