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CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

R olfe did not move.

Over his shoulder, Cassia could see that a man holding a walking staff had suddenly appeared through a break in the trees several yards away. He was shading his eyes against the sun to peer at them. She could have sworn she heard Rolfe curse under his breath.

“Yes, sir, everything is fine. Quite fine, thank you.”

The man, suddenly realizing what he’d stumbled into, stepped back, eyes wide. “Quite.”

The man began to beat a hasty retreat, but it was too late. Whatever magic that had wound its way around them had gone, leaving the two of them standing now in an awkward silence.

“Cassia, I...”

Cassia bit her lip. “I—I truly don’t know what to say. I’m usually only concerned with slapping the face of the man who would dare try to kiss me, words are not necessary. But with you, it was different.”

“Indeed, it is.” Rolfe looked at her softly, then said, “Much as I hate to, I think we’d better start back to the horses, in case there is anyone else about.”

It was only then that Cassia realized she’d been standing there, talking to him while her shirtfront was unbuttoned. “Would you please turn so I might arrange myself?”

Rolfe did as she bid.

After she’d finished, he took Cassia’s hand and started walking with her.

They did not speak, each of them lost to their own private thoughts.

Cassia felt a strangeness, a sensation almost like the holding of her breath, as if she feared by letting that breath go, she would lose all this new and wonderful thing in her life.

She wished they could stay there in the park, but knew of course, that was impossible.

At least, she thought, they’d had that moment together, she with this man who had saved her life, the two of them together, without having to think of what awaited them.

“You know,” Rolfe said finally, breaking the silence between them, “there was a pond much like this at my family’s home in Shropshire when I was a boy.

I used to skip stones across it. The view was so breathtaking, my father had a small stone belvedere built beside it.

I remember how my mother would sit on a weathered stone bench there, reading from her poetry books for hours. ”

“Your mother’s name was Abigail.”

And then Cassia said suddenly, “I don’t even know how I know that.”

“Most probably you recall me telling it to you when you were ill. I tried to pass the time while you slept. I didn’t really expect you to remember anything I said to you.”

“Oh, but I do remember. And your father’s name was George. George Brodrigan, and he was a viscount.”

Rolfe nodded. “Viscount Blackwood to be precise.”

“And you had two sisters, twins, named Sarah and Mary. They had blonde hair. They took after your mother in that respect, where you inherited your dark hair from your father’s side of the family.”

Rolfe smiled. “You are right again. I had no idea you could hear me. Your memory is uncanny.”

“I feel as if should I pass them in the street, I would know them. I should like to meet them someday. Where are they now? Are they at your family’s estate?”

Rolfe’s smile faded then, and he shook his head. “I am afraid my family is gone now.”

Cassia put a gloved hand to his arm. He hadn’t told her that much of the story when she’d been ill, for she knew she would have remembered it. “All of them?”

“Yes. They were lost when the Blackwood estate was besieged and set alight by Roundhead troops at the outbreak of the Civil War.”

Cassia was horrified. “But, why?”

“That is a question that still plagues me in the dark hours of the night. From what I could learn, the Parliamentarians had learned my father was staunchly Royalist in his views. Apparently he had been instrumental in helping a known fugitive escape to France. That fugitive was the son from one of the neighboring estates. We had known their family for generations. The soldiers who came to arrest my father apparently decided to mete out justice—or what they called justice—directly rather than through a court of law. They set the house on fire.”

“But your mother, and your sisters...”

“Casualties of war,” he said bitterly. It was a term that had been used in the letter informing him of the tragedy.

Cassia hesitated, turning toward him. “I am so sorry for your loss. However did you manage to escape?”

Rolfe swallowed against the bitter taste that had come, as it always did.

“I escaped , Lady Cassia, because I was not there when it happened. I had gone off to the Colonies in America. I had considered settling there and very nearly did, until my family was taken from me. I returned immediately when I received the letter informing me of what had happened.” He stared off at the ground at their feet, contemplative.

“My father hadn’t wanted me to leave England.

He told me I needed to stay. He told me it was my duty to carry on the Blackwood title.

But I was full of dreams of adventure and the New World.

I would that I could have been as proud of the title myself.

Perhaps then I would have been there, where I belonged, instead of halfway around the world. ”

Cassia put her hand over his, seeing his grief. She wished she could do something to ease the pain that burned in his eyes, but knew she could not. Nothing would bring his family back. Nothing would take away his pain.

“England was a different place then,” Rolfe went on.

“A place divided by religious dissention and politics that was quickly turning to war. The government encouraged it. I saw whole families destroyed by it, brother pitted against brother, father against son. I grew tired of it, so tired of it. I wanted to find a place to live where there wouldn’t be this fighting, this constant struggle for power between Parliament and the Crown.

My father couldn’t understand this. He loved England to his very soul, but he did not begrudge me my feelings.

I was my father’s only son, his heir. Continuity was most important to him.

He feared if I went to the Colonies, I would be murdered by savages.

He’d heard stories of other Englishmen losing their lives to the natives.

He asked me not to go even as he knew I would.

Our last conversation wasn’t a pleasant one.

We parted poorly. Ironically, going to the Colonies ended up saving my life.

And it is something I will regret for the rest of my life. ”

Cassia came around to face him. “Surely you do not think that you are the cause of what happened to your family?”

“No, but I might have been able to prevent it, or at least I could have helped them to escape, had I been there. But the truth is I will never know, and that is something I must live with.”

Cassia was looking into his eyes, trying to think of something to say to offer him some comfort.

All of her life, she’d lived in a family that didn’t care about each other, in fact, tried everything they could to destroy one another.

Here Rolfe stood, the only survivor from a family that had loved and cared about one another deeply.

Tears began to fall then, running down her cheeks.

She couldn’t stop them for they were tears that had been locked away too long.

Rolfe didn’t say anything to her to try and stop her weeping.

He somehow sensed her need for the release from the pain, the misery she held inside of her.

He remembered that place Cordelia had told him about, where Cassia locked away all her emotions, all the harshness that had touched her life.

In that place, the floodgates had just opened, bursting free, having been held tightly shut for too long.

So Rolfe just pulled Cassia against him, and wrapped her in his arms. He stood and sheltered her against the grief that was pouring through her. It touched him deeply that his having told her about his family had made her feel something again.

Finally, after a time, she lifted her eyes to his. She sniffed. Rolfe retrieved and handed her his handkerchief.

“Blow your nose before you catch a chill.”

She did as he’d told her.

“Shall we return to the horses then?”

Cassia nodded and, together, they started back along the edge of the pond.

“I was rather hoping this ride would lift your spirits, not drag them down further,” he said.

Cassia shook her head. “No, please, the ride is really most enjoyable. Exactly what I needed.”

Rolfe took her by the waist and lifted her, setting her softly atop Clover’s back. The moment she settled herself in the saddle, the horse threw up her head and bucked. Then with a snort, she bolted.

“Cassia!”

They were off before Rolfe could grab hold of the reins, running off at a gallop across the field.

Rolfe vaulted onto Dante’s back, digging his heels into the horse’s sides, racing after them. It only took a few minutes for Dante’s longer stride and faster gait to catch up to the slower mare.

As he started to approach them, Rolfe saw that the reins were loose and flying about, hanging dangerously close to Clover’s pounding front hooves. Cassia was hunched over the horse’s neck, holding tightly to her mane, trying everything to keep from falling off.

“Hold on,” he shouted over the thundering hoof beats. “I am going to try and grab the rein.”

He urged Dante on even more, moving alongside the panicked mare.

He reached out his gloved hand. The rein was jerking about as the mare galloped on.

Each time he thought he had it, the leather twisted away.

Rolfe looked in front of them. A feeling of dread twisted through his gut.

Not more than a few hundred feet in front of them lay a heavy copse of trees.

He’d never be able to stop the racing horse once they reached the tree line.

He dug in his heels against Dante’s sides. “Come on, boy,” he shouted.

He knotted his own reins and released them, squeezing his legs around Dante’s middle. He reached out with both hands. The trees were drawing ever closer.

“Cassia, try to reach out your hand.”

Just as they were coming to the edge of the field, Rolfe managed to grasp the wayward reins.

He sat back and gave a sharp pull. As the horse jerked to an abrupt halt, he was able to grasp Cassia and bring her over and across his legs onto Dante’s back.

He held her tightly against him. The tree line lay just a few yards in front of them.

They were both breathing heavily.

“Are you all right?”

He pulled her back to look at her, running his hands over her face, her shoulders, her arms.

Cassia blinked, her riding hat having fallen off. “Yes, I think so. A little frightened, but fine.”

Rolfe carefully helped Cassia slide from the saddle. He dropped to the ground beside her. Dante’s sides were heaving, his nostrils blowing, fogging from the run. Rolfe patted the side of his neck.

“I was assured that mare had a gentle nature,” he said walking over to the bay. The horse was breathing hard, and looked most distressed. “I don’t see any injury to her leg. She seems fine now ...”

He patted his hands over the saddle, pushing against it.

Clover threw up her head with a squeal, and danced sideways.

“What in the ...?”

Rolfe examined the saddle more thoroughly.

He started testing all the fastenings, trying to see it something might be pinching the horse.

It was then he noticed that one of the billets on the saddle had been cut.

It was a fresh cut, the leather clean along the edges.

Only a small fragment of the strap remained, holding the saddle intact.

He pulled on the strap and it finally broke free. The saddle drooped limply to the side.

“Bloody hell, this strap was cut. A few seconds longer and you’d have fallen off.”

Cassia came to his side, looking at the damaged strap. “But that still doesn’t explain why she would have bolted off like that.”

Rolfe pulled the saddle away. It was then he saw a small, spiked object that was embedded in Clover’s back underneath the saddle cloth. Rolfe pulled the item free, inspecting it. “It’s the seed casing from a thornapple plant, dried and brittle. Those thorns are as sharp as needles.”

“No wonder she bolted,” Cassia said, rubbing her hand over Clover’s neck. The horse nudged her gently with her nose as if trying to apologize for having frightened her. “But however did it get there?”

Rolfe frowned. “Someone obviously put it there.”

“What if it was already on her back somehow before the groomsman put the saddle on and he didn’t notice it?”

Rolfe shook his head, refusing the idea.

“Even if it had, which I doubt, the saddle billet didn’t come apart on its own.

Someone has cut it. Someone wanted to see you get hurt.

” He glanced over to the trees. “You’d have been killed if you’d reached that tree line.

You would have knocked your head against a limb or dashed it on a rock as soon as that saddle came loose.

” His jaw tensed. “Someone planned this. Someone who wanted you to fall.”

Rolfe took the mare’s reins and started over for Dante.

“What are you going to do?”

He tethered the mare to a fastening on Dante’s saddle. “I am going to find out who the bloody bastard is who is trying to hurt you, and when I do, I’m going to thrash him.”