Lessons from a Scandalous Bride (Forgotten Princesses #2)(66)

She started to hold up a hand to wave goodbye, but that felt so inadequate. How did one say farewell to the husband you were leaving forever? Forever. The notion rang like a death knell in her heart. Her eyes burned and she blinked rapidly.

“Cleo?” Jack was at her side, his hand taking her elbow. She sent him a sharp glance. He wore one of his ridiculous jackets. A bright shade of purple that seemed to belie his serious countenance. “Are you certain you want to leave?”

“Yes.” Why must everyone ask her that?

Was she certain she must go? Yes.

Was she certain she should never see her husband again? Yes.

Was she certain she loved him?

Turning, she hurried into the waiting carriage, lest she answer that question in her mind. She nodded a tight greeting for Annalise, who stared at her with sympathy. Cleo looked away, refusing to hazard a guess at what she might be thinking—this girl who believed in fairy tales and happy endings.

Her father joined them inside the carriage. He gave a brisk knock on the ceiling and in moments they were moving. Anxiety rode high in her chest, rising into her throat, making it difficult to breathe.

Jack watched her anxiously as if she might swoon. She pasted a smile on her face that felt as brittle as glass—and told herself she simply had to hold on. Get past this. Put distance between herself and Logan. Soon, she’d be far from here and she’d forget. Common sense would prevail and she’d stop loving him.

From atop the scaffolding high along the wall, Logan watched the two carriages wind their way through the village, his heart clenching at the sight. Cleo was in the first carriage. She’d been standing too far away for him to read her precise expression before she climbed inside. Had she wanted him to say something? To cry out and beg her to stop?

“She’s gone,” Simon announced needlessly from the scaffolding beside him.

Logan nodded.

Simon followed his gaze, his youthful face reflecting all of his bewilderment. “I don’t understand. You like her . . . and I don’t care what you say. I know she cares for you, too.”

Logan continued to look out at the horizon. The carriages were small, no bigger than his thumb in the distance. Soon they would round the turn and be out of sight. Gone for good.

Simon made a grunt of disgust. In his world, husbands and wives stayed together. The only time his father had left was to fight in the Crimea. Wives never left. “Is she ever coming back?”

Logan watched as the first carriage, the one Cleo occupied, took that final turn. She was gone.

“No.”

He turned his attention back to the task at hand, stepping off the scaffolding and onto a jutting ledge. “She’s not. You coming?” He looked back at his brother.

Simon glanced around the scaffolding. “I forgot my pickax.” Shrugging at his forgetfulness, he crouched down and descended the ladder to retrieve the tool he would need for the day’s work.

Logan advanced along what was once a thick stone-fortified wall but was now only a crumbling outer shell, offering no protection to the interior room whatsoever. The entire thing needed to come down. Even if it meant removing each and every stone by hand.

Gripping his own ax, he strode inside the cavernous room. Now empty of furniture, it had once been a bedchamber. Flexing his fingers around the ax’s handle, he joined the other two laborers already at work, attacking the outer wall and sending stone raining down into the yard.

He worked with a fury, taking solace in the labor. By the end of the day he intended to be aching sore and exhausted—too weary to contemplate Cleo and what precisely he felt within himself.

He lifted his ax and took a healthy whack. Stone sparked and crumbled. He grunted, and repeated the motion. The sound of steel hitting rock filled the air.

Arm pulled back, he was in mid-swing when the earth spit up a growl and rumbled all around him. He dropped his tool, arms reaching, stretching out to hold on to something amid his suddenly shifting, shuddering world. But there was nothing to grab. Only air.

One of the men beside him shouted. The other one dove for the ground.

And then there was nothing. Not even that anymore. The ground opened in a great, hungry maw beneath his feet. The floor gave out, disappearing in a fierce cloud of rock and rubble and debris. Taking him with it.





Chapter Twenty-nine

Cleo watched as her father removed his gloves and slapped them against his hands. The small taproom was crowded at this hour, and he eyed their surroundings impatiently, ostensibly hoping that they might be served by one of the harried-looking servant girls sometime soon.

Jack stood up from the table, his impatience getting the better of him. “I’ll go speak with the innkeeper and see when we might expect service.”

Cleo watched him stalk away, feeling as miserable as ever. In fact, with every mile they’d traveled, a pore-deep misery had infiltrated every inch of her.

“Are you well?” Annalise asked from beside her, blinking those wide brown eyes of hers with their impossibly long lashes.

Cleo nodded mutely. She should ask Annalise the same question. With her handicap, cooped up in a carriage for hours couldn’t be that comfortable. Only Cleo couldn’t muster the energy or inclination to talk.

“I’m certain a warm meal will do you good,” Marguerite volunteered.

Cleo stared out at her bleakly. “Will it?” She wasn’t convinced she’d ever feel well again.