Trial by Desire (Carhart #2)(26)



“And you always assumed too much of me,” Louisa said simply. “I’m not strong, not the way you are.”

Kate kept her gaze on the waving field of grass. Through the uneven glass, she could not make out individual blades. Instead, they passed back and forth, rippling like a sea. If Louisa could see into Kate’s heart right now, Louisa would not call her strong. She feared Harcroft. The terror of discovery filled her almost to panic. Her own husband might betray her at any moment, and still she wished he had taken her last night.

She wasn’t strong.

No; Kate was afraid. But she had become an expert at hiding her emotion behind a veneer of practicality. And now her husband was threatening even that.

She waited for practicality to win out before speaking. “There’s nothing to fear.” She raised her chin and caught a glimpse of motion cresting the hill. Her blood ran cold; practicality disappeared in a flap of brown fabric. In the space of time it took Kate to gulp breath into her seizing lungs, she saw men on horseback. She knew these horses. It was Harcroft and her husband. While they’d broken their fast this morning, they had talked of visiting a few nearby hamlets, of making a few inquiries. Kate just hadn’t expected them to take this tiny path to the west.

“Get down,” she hissed.

Louisa dropped to a crouch—quickly enough that Jeremy opened his eyes, blinking in confusion. They huddled on the floor.

So long as they were very still…

Jeremy began to cry. He didn’t start with little sobs, either; instead, he screwed up his nose and screamed. Kate hadn’t realized that a bundle of cloth scarcely larger than a large cabbage could generate so much noise. She stared at Louisa in appalled horror. There was nothing to do about it. Louisa patted him ineffectually on the back, and cast a worried glance at Kate.

There was still no reason the men would come up to this cabin. The track they were on passed a quarter mile from here, leading over the ridge to a village eight miles away. Even if they came near, unless they passed close enough to peer in the window, they would see nothing but a shepherd’s cottage, abandoned in the autumn. And loud as Jeremy was, they would still have to come very close to hear his wails.

Wouldn’t they?

Kate’s hands were cold. She wasn’t sure if she trembled, or if it was Louisa; their shoulders were pressed together so that their shivers merged into one. Kate could not let herself be overtaken by fear. If the men came close—if they came by—she would need to act quickly, to forestall their inevitable questions. The pistol, after all, would be of no use.

Jeremy’s wails paused, as he gulped breath. For a brief instant she could hear the wind in the weeds, the entirely inappropriate happy trill of a blackbird outside. He started again, but his startled screams were dying down, trickling into a few minute sobs. Still, she imagined she could feel the vibration of horses’ hooves drawing closer and closer, across the field. She waited, her fingers clenching.

But no, that cantering was only the wild beat of her own heart. There was nothing.

No sound, except the last gurgle of Jeremy’s outburst. They were safe.

“You see?” she breathed with a shaky a smile. “Nothing to worry about. I’ll just pop up and check—”

She drew up into a crouch, and then pulled herself up to the window.

Not two hundred yards away, Harcroft and Ned were racing across the fields. They were traversing the meadow parallel to the cottage. Headed away, but that would change if they saw a woman standing at the window. Kate froze with fear.

A sudden movement would attract more attention. Slowly she stepped back into the shadows. She watched them, her heart pounding, as they spurred their horses onward. They passed by, and then took the hill behind the cottage at a trot.

Halfway up, Ned turned in the saddle. She could not see his face, but from his stance, he could have been looking straight at her. It was unlikely he could see into the room, dimly lit as it was. It was impossible that he could make out her features through the poorly made glass. It was inconceivable that he would somehow comprehend what was happening. Kate repeated these things to herself, in fervent supplication.

Perhaps those desperate prayers were heard, because he turned away. She watched his form, wavy and distorted by the glass, until the rise of the hill swallowed him.

Only then did Kate draw breath into her aching lungs. “They’re gone,” she croaked, her tone as cheerful as she could manage. “You were right under Harcroft’s nose, dear, and he didn’t suspect a thing. You see, there’s nothing to worry about.”

“Yes,” Louisa said, sounding equally unconvinced. She looked down into Jeremy’s face. “You see?” she told him. “We’re perfectly safe.”

CHAPTER EIGHT

KATE DIDN’T DARE RETURN to Berkswift by way of the well-used road that led straight there. Visiting Louisa had been risk enough. But if she met Harcroft along that dusty track, his suspicions, never quiet, would leap up.

Instead, she took a route that cut circuitously along fence boundaries, dipping through a small scrub forest. It lengthened her journey from two hours to three. Shadows stretched as she walked. The path led over a small stream, its waters crossable only by means of a few slippery rocks, dotting the trail. She started across, balancing her empty basket on her arm. The stream was shielded on both sides from the sun by a small copse of trees, which dropped yellowing leaves into the mulch underfoot. The walk had calmed her fears. The fields had been quiet, and this little stream presented the perfect picture of solitude: quiet, but for the burble of the water, and hidden from view. She stepped on the last rock, green with moss, almost at the far bank.

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