by CJ Archer
***
Orlando stood on a path in the center of Stoneleigh's neglected formal garden and didn't move. From her bedchamber window, Susanna could just make out his blond head in the pathetic moonlight. He must have removed his hat, or perhaps it had fallen off when he last circled the house. He'd been around dozens of times since she'd retreated to her room, each time his pace slowing, his shoulders hunching further. He must be extremely cold, yet he didn't use the blanket she'd ordered Hendricks to give him.
Fool. Madman. Utter, utter, stupid bloody fool!
She pulled the edges of her housecoat tighter at her throat. With no fire burning in the hearth, the chamber was freezing. What must it be like out there in wet clothes, driving rain, and a wintry wind?
He was quite still except for the ends of his damp hair fluttering in the wind. The collapsed borders and overgrown hedges of the once beautiful formal garden surrounded him. She couldn't see them but she knew the weeds outnumbered the decorative plants. It was difficult to tell if he was looking up at her window, but even if he was, he couldn't possibly see her, half-hidden in the dark as she was.
He suddenly set off again and she counted to one hundred and seven slowly, the time it had taken him to circuit Stoneleigh last time. One hundred and seven passed. One hundred and ten, one hundred and fifty. Two hundred.
Where was he?
She peered out her window, but there was no sign of him. She went out to her parlor and looked through the windows there, then the other windows on the first floor all around the house. The only ones she left alone were in her father's rooms. He was blessedly unaware of the drama that had unfolded at Stoneleigh and that was exactly how she wanted it.
With her heart in her throat, she returned to her bedchamber. Another check out the window proved he had not returned. Perhaps he had finally gone into the stables and found some dry straw. Or perhaps he had succumbed to the cold.
Oh God, oh God.
She could no longer bear it. She threw off her housecoat and quickly dressed in her gardening men's clothes and her warmest cloak. She ran down the stairs to the empty kitchen. Cook and the others had long ago gone to bed. Susanna would not wake them. It was her choice to lock Orlando out, just as it was her choice to let him back in.
If this was a trick to get her outside where she would be vulnerable, then so be it. It was a risk she was willing to take because if he was telling the truth and he didn't intend to harm her, the thought of him freezing to death was too horrible to think about.
She threw open the door. Wind and rain lashed her face like sharp talons and the cold stung her eyes. Oh lord, he was out there somewhere in this?
"Orlando?" she called. "Orlando, where are you?"
No answer. The blanket Hendricks had given him lay in a wet crumpled heap on the porch. She flipped up her hood to cover her head then ventured out through the kitchen garden.
She checked the outbuildings first, but there was no sign of him. She circled the house but couldn't find him. At least he wasn't lying in any obvious places in a frozen heap. She called him, but the wind stripped his name from her mouth before it was barely out and carried it away. After her second circuit round the house, it was hard to distinguish the tears on her cheeks from the rain.
She was about to go around again when a movement in the walled garden caught her eye. She ran to the arched entrance. He was there, tying the corner of one of the canvases to the newly built frame.
"Orlando," she choked out.
"Susanna!" A gust of wind dragged the untied edge of the canvas out of his hands.
"Leave it," she said as he caught it. "Come inside."
He shook his head. "There's no point now. I'm already wet."
"Orlando, please."
"Nearly finished." But he fumbled with the twine and she realized his fingers must be terribly numb.
She took the canvas from him. It was the last corner to be secured. He'd covered all the trees, somehow managing the canvases on his own despite the wind and his wretchedness.
"Come inside," she shouted into the gale. But when she reached the arch and looked back, he hadn't moved. He stared at her.
"Orlando, come on! You need to get warm and dry."
"Are you sure?"
She nodded and if he noticed her hesitation, he didn't show it. He followed her. She bent her head against the rain but he didn't bother.
They crept back into the house and up the stairs, leaving puddles behind on every step. Worry dogged her as she watched his painfully slow pace, but not doubt. In her heart, she knew she was doing the right thing.
She only wished her head agreed with her.