Blackmoore(36)

to me. That left me in my mother’s power, and regret at my hasty bargain threatened to turn me inside out. I closed my eyes and wished I could go back in time and undo the pact I had made. Why had I given her such an open option with the outcome? Because I could not anticipate failing.

Now, though, I shrank inside at the thought of what she might do once she learned of my failure.

A few obvious ideas came to mind. She could force me to marry Mr.

Cooper. She could send me to live with Eleanor in London and take care of her children. She could even come up with some scheme, as she had for Eleanor in Brighton. I shuddered at the thought of what she might dream up. There were no bounds to her opportunism and no moral limits either.

A familiar whistle caught my ears. I tilted my head, listening hard, and heard it again. It was a blackbird,with its call of homecoming. A smile crept across my face. I cupped my hands around my mouth and whistled back. A moment later the call came again. We called back and forth, and I peered through the fog for Henry’s figure. He never came, though, and after a long stretch of waiting I realized, to my chagrin, that it must have been a real blackbird I had been hearing.

I sighed, leaned back on my hands, and tipped my face up to the lightening sky. A thought nudged at my conscious. A hint of a thought, even. Some sense that there was a solution to my problem and that I would find it if I just thought about it long enough and hard enough.

I replayed in my mind the conversation I had had with Mama in her bedroom. She had wanted me to commit to marrying—I had in-sisted I never would. I had shouted at her, I remembered. I had asked her how many proposals I would have to refuse before she believed that I was serious about never marrying. Three. I sat up straight. Was I sure those were our words? I thought carefully. The conversation felt burned into my memory. It was too significant—I would not remember it wrong. Yes.

I was certain. I had asked about proposals. She had given me the number three. I did not have to convince three gentlemen to propose to me; I had only to receive three proposals.

105



J u l i a n n e D o n a l D s o n Hope and relief surged through me, as light and free as the dark bird soaring outside its cage. I needed only one man who would be willing to propose to me three times, one man who was friend enough to grant me this favor. A smile flashed across my face.

But almost immediately, the flying of my hope faltered. My heart sickened. Could I do such a thing? Could I really ask Henry to propose to me? And if he agreed to this scheme, could I endure the agony of hearing him say the words I had craved for so long,knowing that I would have to refuse him?

Dread roiled around within me, tugging at the parts of my heart that I had shut tight. I gripped my wind-blown hair in one hand and rested my forehead in the other. Danger lived in this scheme. Not for Henry— he had his path set out ahead of him. He had his Miss St. Claire and his Blackmoore and the living of this estate to provide him with lifelong com-fort and respectability. He would not suffer from granting me this favor.

But, oh, it was very possible that I would suffer.

I lifted my head and shoved the thought away, quickly, before it had time to take root. Nothing bad would happen. This was my escape! This was the answer to all my problems, and my heart was in no danger. I had locked it up tight a year and a half before. It was secure. It would do exactly what I demanded of it. After all, I had seen Henry practically every day of these past eighteen months, and never had I faltered in my resolve.

Not once had I questioned my decisions or done anything to weaken them—not by touch or word or deed. I could ask Henry for three proposals. He would do that for me. And then I would have my dream of India.

Excitement surged so fast and furious within me that I felt in danger of breaking into flight. I stood up from my perch and clambered down the outcropping of stone. My feet slipped on the slick rock. My hands scraped. I skidded and slid, and the ground rushed up much too fast.

A quick thudding reached my ears as I scrabbled for a handhold and caught myself, legs swinging free. Looking over my shoulder, I checked 106



the ground below, and finding it within reach, dropped to my feet, brushed off my hands, and turned with a smile.

Mr. Brandon—the younger Mr. Brandon—stood not more than a yard away, a look of great surprise on his face.

“Oh!” I was startled and couldn’t think of anything more to say.

“That was brilliant!” A slow smile curved his lips, and admiration gleamed in his eyes. “I was running to save you, but apparently I could have spared myself the effort.”

His footsteps must have been the thudding sound I had heard as I started slipping down the rock.

“Yes. Well . . .” I rubbed my forehead, feeling awkward, and wondered how rude it would seem if I were to just walk away. But he looked as if he was waiting for some sort of explanation. So I shrugged. “I climb out of windows a lot.”

His full smile was beyond infectious—it was stunning, especially with the sunlight that finally shone through the fog, highlighting his golden hair.

“Do you really?” he asked, moving closer to me.

I pushed my tangled hair back, thinking of how I had come to the moors straight from bed, how the wind had been whipping my hair, and how I must have looked at least bedraggled, if not worse.

But the admiring gleam did not leave the younger Mr. Brandon’s eyes, which were, I noticed, almost exactly the same laurel green as the vegeta-tion surrounding us. His smile felt like an extra dose of sunshine directed at me.