Dear God, how she wanted the agony of his pleasure!
Katherine…Kate.
Her body trembled, her heart pounded, but she wasn’t afraid. She wanted him in bed with her, their arms and legs entwined until it was impossible to tell where she ended and he began, his weight pressing her down—
He grabbed her shoulders and shook hard. “Kate!”
She startled, her eyes flying open.
“Miss Kate—wake up!” Dorrie shook her again.
In a fleeting moment of panic, her heart racing, she sat up and glanced around. The rain pounded down against the window and broke the stillness of the dark, cold bedroom. But Edward wasn’t there. She’d only been dreaming of him. Again.
Kate stifled a yawn. “What time is it?”
“Almost midnight.”
“What’s the matter?”
“Emma Mulderry’s son came to fetch you—”
“The baby!” Instantly awake, Kate flew out of bed and hurried to her dressing table. “Run down to the kitchens and wake Tom,” she ordered. “Tell him to saddle Misty, then fetch my saddlebags from the laboratory. And put the bottle of port from the sitting room into the bag, too, will you?”
“Yes, miss!” She scurried from the room.
Kate scrambled into her clothes, forgoing her pretty riding coat for more study layers, and stomped into a pair of old boots. She bothered with her hair only enough to twist it into a knot at her neck, then grabbed her coat and wide-brimmed hat to keep the rain off her face. As she left, she took the pillowcase off her bed.
By the time she reached the front door, the leather bags waited for her. Filled with her medical tools and medicines, her kit wasn’t much, but she kept everything ready in case of emergencies to help however she could. She mounted her mare and hurried off into the storm.
Mud and water covered the dirt road as she rode toward the village. Normally, she would have gone through the fields, fording the river where it widened just below the locks and the old lockkeeper’s cottage. But tonight the river ran high and fast, swollen from the rains, so she continued on the roads and crossed over the wooden bridge north of the village.
The simple, three-room cottage where Emma Mulderry lived with her husband, John, and their five children stood on the far end of the village. Their middle son stood outside in the rain, waiting anxiously for her to arrive. Kate dismounted and handed him the reins. Without knocking, she pushed open the narrow front door.
Only two stubby candles and a weak fire lit the main room, but in the dim light, she saw the three youngest children sitting on chairs against the wall, staring toward the bedroom with worried eyes. Dim figures stirred in the bedroom beyond, with the wife lying on the bed, the husband holding her hand.
Emma Mulderry nodded at Kate’s arrival, and with a moan, she dug the flat of her palms against the sides of her bulging stomach as a hard labor pain seized her.
“I came as quickly as I could,” Kate apologized, then went right to work, setting her saddlebags on the plank table in the center of the main room and digging out her supplies. “How long have you been in labor?”
Dark circles framed tired eyes in the strained face, and sweat beaded on her brow. “Since early afternoon.”
“How far apart are the pains?” Kate had delivered enough babies to understand the timing of the pains and how to gauge how much longer she had left.
“Close,” the woman whispered, relaxing as the labor pain subsided.
Giving birth to her sixth child, Emma was more experienced at this than Kate, but she would do her best to help. She turned to the oldest of the two daughters sitting on the chairs. At eight, the girl was old enough to assist her. “Eliza, I need you to put on a kettle of water and heat it for me, all right?”
Eliza nodded and, with a hesitant look at her mother, went to the fireplace, where a copper kettle hung on a large metal hook. She took it down and carried it outside to the well.
Just as she slipped outside, the middle son scurried into the house from stabling her horse.
“Jacob,” Kate ordered, nodding to the two younger children, “take your brother and sister down to Mrs. Bailey’s for the night.”
He nodded, obviously grateful to be sent anyplace else. “Yes, miss!” Then he herded the younger children out the door and into the rain, which now fell in hard waves across the village.
“Mr. Mulderry.” Kate turned to the husband. “I need you to leave, too, please.”
With a parting glance at his wife, he nodded and left without protest. A birthing room was not the place for men.
Finally alone with Emma, Kate sat down on the stool beside the bed and took her hand, feigning more bravery than she felt. “This baby is going to arrive just fine.”
At that faint reassurance, the woman nodded, but her lips pressed together grimly.
Carrying the heavy kettle with both hands, Eliza waddled into the house. Kate poured some of the water into a basin, then set the kettle into the fireplace, and in a matter of minutes, the water was hot. Kate spooned an herb mixture into a mug, then filled it with hot water and handed it to Emma, ordering her softly to drink the mixture to help with the discomfort. Then she soaked a cloth in the bowl of cold water and placed it onto Emma’s forehead as she eased her onto her back.
Delicately, Kate moved her hands over the bulging belly to feel for the baby’s position. “Everything seems fine,” she sighed with deep relief. “Now, we just have to wait.”
She returned to the bed to spend the next hour holding Emma’s hand through the pains.
Outside, the storm intensified. The rain poured down as thunder echoed across the village, and the wind picked up steadily. The rain and cold had driven John Mulderry back inside from the barn to pace the main room. Kate hadn’t the heart to ask him to leave again.
A knock pounded at the door, but Kate ignored the interruption and kept her attention on Emma, who gripped her hand tightly for support. The baby was coming. Soon.
“I’m searching for Katherine Benton.” The masculine voice carried as deeply as the thunder rolling overhead.
Edward. Her heart thudded hard in a jumble of emotions. With a quick squeeze to Emma’s hand and a promise to be right back, she slipped into the main room.
He stepped in from the pouring rain, his large presence instantly filling the tiny house. Water dripped from his long coat and muddy boots, and his dark eyes, nearly hidden beneath the brim of his hat, scanned the dimly lit room.
Then he saw her. With an expression mixed of fury and relief, he crossed the room to her and took her arm to draw her aside.
“Are you mad,” he demanded, keeping his voice low, “leaving the house alone in the middle of a storm?”
“I’ve gone out many nights in rain much harder than this.”
“Tonight’s rain has turned into a flood,” he corrected, worried anger hardening his face. “You should have told me.”
She certainly did not need his permission to leave her house. “I do not—”
“I would have come with you to make certain you were safe.”
Her heart skipped. Whatever sharp retort she’d been about to deliver was lost.
To make certain she was safe…Was he worried about her? Her chest warmed. Perhaps she was beginning to mean more to him than just the burden of a guardianship, after all.
Her breath caught—where on earth had that thought come from?
True, just a few hours ago, he was teaching her how to kiss, and she’d enjoyed it. Much more than she should have. But that had only been an object lesson in how little she knew about him. And she obviously didn’t know him nearly well enough to wonder whether he had come after her through the storm because she was his ward or because he cared about her.
“I didn’t want to wake you,” she offered instead.
“I wasn’t asleep.” At the sultry murmur, heat swirled down her spine. “I was still wide awake because of you.”
She stared wordlessly into his face, sti
ll damp from the rain. He had ridden through a storm at night across unfamiliar countryside to find her. To protect her. No one had ever done anything like that for her before, and it made her throat tighten with emotion. So did the implication in his reply. That she bothered him enough to keep him from sleeping.
And that made her tremble.
He blew out a heavy breath, and sudden relief eased the tension in his broad shoulders. “Don’t ever run off like that again, Katherine.”
Run off? Hardly. At that moment, she wanted nothing more than to wrap her arms around his neck, press herself close, kiss him…With a hard swallow, she nodded.
To think, just days ago she had been frightened of him and wanted nothing more than for him to leave and never bother her again.
As his gaze drifted toward the bedroom, she knew there would be time later to sort out what all this meant. But now, she was needed here.
“How can I help?” he asked as if reading her thoughts.
She withdrew the port from her saddlebag and pressed the bottle into his hand. “Take Mr. Mulderry to the barn?”
He nodded his understanding.
As she turned back toward the bedroom, he stopped her with a light touch to her arm. He stole a moment from her to brush a curl from her tired forehead and tuck it behind her ear. Only a small gesture, but Kate felt her heart skip at its reassuring familiarity, at the warm comfort it stirred inside her.
“Mr. Mulderry.” Edward slapped his arm around the man’s shoulder and led him toward the door. “Nothing for us men to do here. Join me in the barn for a drink.”
They stepped into the howling wind and rain, closing the door behind them. And Kate returned to the bedside as the hard labor began.
Finally, after what seemed like hours, the baby emerged, and Kate’s hands trembled as she lifted it into her arms, small but pink and healthy. With a hard shudder, the baby began to cry. At first a soft burbling as it struggled to fill its tiny lungs with air and breathe in its new life, then growing into a strong wail.
Kate carried the baby to the basin and gently washed warm water over it, then swaddled it in the pillowcase she’d pulled from her bed and placed the infant into Emma’s arms. Tears ran down the mother’s cheeks.
“It’s a girl,” Kate whispered, fighting the pull of emotions inside her. She was so happy for Emma, yet so sad that she would never experience being a mother herself.
“Thank you.” Emma pulled the baby closer. “Oh, thank you!”
Kate’s throat tightened at the scene of love in front of her. “I’ll get your husband,” she offered.
But she didn’t have to. The baby’s cries had reached the barn, even through the black rain, and Mr. Mulderry had come running. When he saw the baby, he beamed and charged through the house to his wife’s side.
Kate watched in happy fascination as the giant man gently pulled the pillowcase down with his large forefinger to stare in wonder at the tiny babe.
A hand rested possessively against her lower back. “You are the most amazing woman,” Edward said quietly behind her.
“I didn’t do anything.” She fought down the blush at his compliment.
The way Edward’s eyes flickered told her he disagreed, but instead of challenging her, he lowered his head to brush his mouth against her temple. “You are beautiful.”
Then she did blush, hot and scarlet and embarrassed. “I look a fright.”
“I didn’t mean your appearance.”
In that moment, the coldness she had come to associate with him vanished, replaced by a low, smoldering heat she felt all the way down between her legs. She had no words to answer him.
“Come on,” he murmured. “Let’s get you home.”
He helped her into her coat, then turned her to face him, and he fastened the buttons all the way up to her chin to make certain she would be safe against the storm. He was protecting her again, just as he’d already done so much to help her with Brambly.
Her throat clenched at the generosity of all he’d done for her, this man who claimed less than a fortnight ago that he was capable of evil and did not deserve her compassion. He had been so wrong.
He frowned down at her, his hands resting lightly on her shoulders. “Is something wrong?”
“Edward, I…” Blinking hard, she wanted to tell him how grateful she was that he cared about her, that having him near drove away the loneliness and fear. But all she could manage was a raspy, “Thank you.”
Wrapping her hands in his coat’s lapels, she tugged herself against him and touched her lips to his.
He tensed for a moment at the unexpected kiss, then he whispered her name, and his arms came up slowly across her back. When the tip of his tongue traced over her lips, tasting at the corner of her mouth, she trembled.
She lowered herself and pulled away, lingering a moment with her hands still tangled in the lapels of his greatcoat and her forehead resting against his shoulder, unable to make herself let go completely.
With a tremulous sigh, she reluctantly stepped back. “We should go now.”
Nodding, he silently took her hand to lead her outside into the storm.
He lifted her onto her horse, and they rode through the cold rain pounding down upon them, drenching them clear through to their skins. Edward rode first, keeping his horse in check and the gait slow so Kate’s mare could make her way more carefully across the cobblestones in the village, then over the slippery layer of mud when the road turned toward the south. His horse was steady, well trained, and walked on calmly, ignoring the storm raging around them.
But her mare was skittish, upset by the booming thunder and flashes of lightning, shying at every shadow. Kate fought to keep her seat.
Edward frowned back at her. “Do you think you can handle her if we trot?”
“Yes,” she affirmed, her chattering teeth hiding her doubt. With her hands so cold she could barely close them around the reins, she simply didn’t know if she could, but she refused to admit it. Chilled to her bones, she shook violently, so cold she ached, and she wanted nothing more than to get back to the warmth of Brambly as quickly as possible. He eased his horse into a trot, and she followed.
When they reached the river, she reined in beside him and tried to peer through the darkness, but the night was too dark, the churning river too black.
“The bridge is out,” he shouted above the noise of the rushing current.
He pointed into the darkness. Her eyes followed, and she saw it—at least two feet of water rushed over the bridge in a torrent.
“Is there another way?” he asked.
“We might be able to ford by the lock.”
“Show me.”
As Kate led him along the river, Edward rode closely at her side. The gusting winds whipped the trees, their boughs creaking and snapping loudly and adding to the noise of the rushing river beside them and the skittishness of her horse. Only when the next flash of lightning lit the black night did she realize that Edward was leaning forward in his saddle, his hand clamped firmly around the mare’s bridle to keep her from dashing away.
When they reached the lock, he pulled both horses to a stop. His face was inscrutable as he scanned the wide, shallow spot in the river and contemplated how deep the water would be, how fast the current.
He shook his head. “We’ll go back to the village.”
She grasped his arm, her head shaking. She was beyond tired, so cold that her teeth hurt from chattering, and she couldn’t bear the thought of riding all those miles back to the village when Brambly was less than two miles away on the other side of the river. “Can we try to cross?”
Even in the darkness, he frowned grimly at the way her body shuddered, and she saw his resolve melt beneath her pleading eyes.
“All right,” he agreed reluctantly. “But keep your feet out of the stirrups until we’re on the other side,” he ordered, “and don’t wrap your hands in the reins.”
She nodded anxiously.
“Follow me, a
nd stay close.”
With a tap of his heels against the colt’s sides, he set the horse forward into the river.
The current ran fast, the water high. After only a few steps into the river, the water came up nearly to the little mare’s belly. But as they went on, the water level stayed steady, and by the middle of the channel, Kate was already focused on the far bank.
Without warning, a large branch rose up from the black water and barreled toward Kate’s mare. Twisting in the boiling current, the branches slammed against her horse’s hindquarters. The mare lost her footing in the raging water and splashed down into the river, kicking and slipping, whinnying frantically.
“Edward!” Kate plunged into the icy water.
She struggled to swim, but the current was too strong for her already tired body, the struggle too hard in the freezing water, which soaked heavy into her skirts and dragged her down. Her fingers turned numb, and the muscles in her arms and legs refused to move.
With a cry, she slipped beneath the black surface.
A strong arm went around her and heaved her up from the water. She clung desperately to him, and her fingers dug into the hard muscle of his forearm as Edward dragged her toward the bank.
Holding her wet body securely in his arms, he carried her from the river and placed her gently on the muddy ground. She gasped and struggled to breathe.
He leaned on bent knees over her drenched body, then began to rub her arms and legs hard to get the warm blood circulating through her. Her skin was cold and clammy, her lungs frozen, but she was alive. Thanks to Edward. He’d risked his life to save hers, and she knew she would never be able to repay him.
“Can you stand?” he demanded above the noise of the storm.
She nodded, and he helped her to her feet. “The horses?”
“Gone.” He grimaced. “And it’s too far back to the village. We’ll freeze before we reach it. We have to find shelter here.”
“There’s an old lockkeeper’s cottage up there.” She pointed a shaking hand toward a narrow footpath leading up from the river. “But it’s been abandoned—”
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