The laundry cart bumped and swayed over the rough, grassy track that led from the river up to the house. Bryony splayed her feet wide, trying to keep her balance on the hard board seat and still stop Simon from climbing out of her arms. The sun was out, bright but distant, leaving the air crisp and fresh enough to bring a healthy red glow to the children's cheeks.
"You're supposed to miss the ruts in the road, Mama," said Patrick Shanaghan after a particularly rough jolt knocked his hat flying. "Not aim for them."
His mother, holding the reins in her broad, capable hands, snorted. " 'Tes no road, this, Patrick me lad. This, 'tes nothin' but a
collection
of ruts." Bryony heard Madeline giggle, and turned her head in time to catch the child's smile.
Bryony smiled herself. A rare glow of peace and happiness seeped through her. Tipping back her head, she watched a band of thin white clouds scuttle across the sparkling sky above. There was something both timeless and extraordinarily soothing about moments such as these, she thought. Women working together while their children laughed and played. The sweet, heart-lifting chirping of birds filling the high branches of the trees. The deep, swift rush of a rain-swollen river curling around the bottom of the hill.
"Looks like the Captain's got a visitor," said Ann McBride, raising an arm to shade her face against the glare of the sun.
Bryony's head snapped around, but she caught only a quick glimpse of a man swinging down from a horse before the cart moved behind the store, hiding the lower end of the yard from sight. "Oh no," she murmured, one hand flying up in a probably futile attempt to shove her hair back up under her cap.
Visitors.
And here she was wearing her old gray work dress and servant's cap.
They pulled up in the sun beside the barn, and Bryony handed Simon to Ann McBride. "I wish there was some way I could get to the house without being seen," she whispered to Mary as she hopped off the cart.
Mary eyed Bryony's water-stained gown and grinned. "Sure then, you look more like a scullery maid than the master's wife." She nodded toward the yard. "And och, that's a fine gentleman what's come callin'."
Bryony started to laugh. Then her gaze fell on the two men facing each other in the yard, and the laughter died on her lips.
Hayden stood with his legs braced in that way he had, his hands on his lean hips, his fingers toying with the hilt of the knife he wore strapped to his thigh. His back was to her. She could not see his face.
Beside him, the other man looked slight. He wore a well-cut coat and a fashionable, curly brimmed beaver pulled down low on his forehead. He was turned half away from her, but there was something familiar about the way he held his head, about the way he moved...
Bryony's heart began to beat in slow, heavy lurches. "Mary," she said in a quick low voice to the other woman. "Mary, get Madeline away from here. Get her away from here fast, and keep her away."
Mary Shanaghan gave Bryony a puzzled look, but moved quickly to do as she'd asked.
Bryony walked toward the middle of the yard, her fingers entwined before her, her limbs moving stiffly, as if she were old, or ill. The stranger turned. Sunlight flashed on gold curls, limned a face so classically perfect in its
features that a woman might stop in the street, just to look at him.
"Oliver.
It was only a whisper, more like a startled exhalation of breath. She stumbled to a halt, unable to think, unable even to breathe. A cool wind whipped at the hem of her skirt and rustled the eucalyptus trees on the hill behind the house. The air was heavy with the smell of lemon gums and newly sown fields—the smells of Australia. She stared at the man who in another time, another place, had been her husband. Who was still, God help her, her husband. And all she could think was:
It's not possible. It cannot be.
Oliver. Oliver was
alive.
God in heaven, she hadn't killed him. And if she hadn't killed him, then that meant she was a free woman.
Grateful, heart-lifting joy flooded through her, followed swiftly by a dismay so deep and terrifying she thought she might die from it. Her gaze flew to Hayden. She felt as if something slammed into her stomach, almost doubling her over in physical agony as she realized that she could lose him. He was her husband, she carried his unborn child within her, but she could lose him. Because her husband, her
other
husband, was alive.
God,
she whispered.
Oh, God. No.
"Bryony?" Oliver stepped toward her. He had a worried look on his face, as if he were not quite sure how she would react to seeing him.
She stared at his once-familiar features, and felt... nothing. "Oliver." She tried to smile at him, but couldn't. "Oliver, you're alive."
He laughed. "Is that the way you greet a husband you haven't seen in two years?" He pulled her into his arms and brought his mouth down on hers in a wet, intimate kiss.
She pressed her hands against his chest and wrenched her head away. "Oliver, please." She stared at him. "How can this be? Where have you been?"
He let go and stepped back. "Where have I been?" he
repeated, his brows drawing together in the beginnings of a frown.
She glanced quickly at Hayden and found him regarding her with an intense, questioning look. He pulled a cheroot from his waistcoat pocket and stuck it between his teeth. "As I understand it," Hayden said, all his attention seemingly focused on lighting his cigar, "Bryony was transported for killing her husband." He exhaled a cloud of white smoke before lifting his cold blue eyes to Oliver's face. "So why aren't you dead?"
"I practically was, thanks to my lovely wife here." The words were said with a lopsided, seemingly humorous smile, but Bryony felt herself blanch. She'd forgotten how casually cruel Oliver could be. "The crew of a French ship hovering off the coast happened to spot me just about the time I thought I couldn't hold on any longer. They pulled me out."
"You've been in France?" she asked. "As a prisoner?"
Oliver returned her intense stare. "There is a war on, remember?"
Bryony felt a lump rise in her throat. She could always tell when Oliver was lying. No, not always, she reminded herself, not at first. But it hadn't taken her long to learn the little signs that gave him away. The almost imperceptible, nervous tug at his lips. The way he made it a point to stare straight into her eyes, as if daring her to disbelieve him. She supposed it was one of the reasons why he'd lost so much money in gaming halls over the years. That classically beautiful face was simply too easy to read.
"When did they let you go, Oliver?" Bryony asked quietly.
He thrust his jaw forward, his voice rising with the threat of righteous indignation that was his usual response whenever she questioned him. "What the hell difference does that make?"
"It makes a big difference, when you disappear for two years and I'm transported for killing you."
He sighed. "Bryony, I came as soon as I could. By the time I got back to Cornwall, you had already been deported. It wasn't as easy as you might think to have your conviction officially overturned, or to secure all the paperwork I needed to guarantee your release."
"You have it, of course," Hayden said.
She saw Oliver's gaze flicker from her to Hayden, then back again. "Of course."
Her release.
A thrill of excitement shot through Bryony. Freedom. Not just a ticket-of-leave, with all its restrictions and the ever present danger of accidental forfeiture, but real freedom. She was almost afraid to believe it.
Oliver reached inside his coat and produced several sheets of parchment, folded together. "I assure you, everything is in order." He held the papers out, not to her, but to Hayden. "So it looks as if you'll be needing to get yourself a new servant," he added as Hayden leafed through the documents. "And a new whore."
Hayden's head snapped back. Bryony saw his eyes narrow dangerously. Quietly, carefully, he folded her papers and slipped them into his pocket.
"You think I don't know what you've been doing to her?" Oliver sneered, his nostrils quivering with disdain, with disgust. "I might have been in this godforsaken colony only a few days, but it's long enough to have heard what goes on here." He seized Bryony's arm, his gaze raking her, his face darkening with rage as he focused on her swollen belly. "Look at you," he spat at her in disgust. "He didn't just crawl between your legs. He planted his bastard on you!"
"Let her go." Cold and deadly as a saber slash, Hayden's voice sliced through Oliver's ugly torrent of words. "Shut your filthy mouth and take your hands off her."
Oliver threw back his head, his lip curling. "She's my
wife,
damn you. If I want to, I can bloody well
beat her,
and you—"
Hayden's fist caught Oliver just under the chin, lifting him up and sending him spilling backward onto the cobbles.
"She might have been your wife in the past, you bastard. But she isn't anymore. She's mine now. And if you ever lay a hand on her again, I swear to God, I'll kill you."
Oliver sat up. His fingers splayed against his chin, he opened and closed his jaw a few times, then reached to pick up the beaver hat that had landed beside him. Only then did he tip back his head and look up at the man who loomed over him.
"Her conviction has been overturned," said Oliver, enunciating the words carefully, as if he thought Hayden might not have understood clearly. "Whether you like it or not, she is not your servant anymore."
"My servant?" Hayden repeated incredulously. "She hasn't been my servant for months.
She's my wife."
"Wife?" Oliver gave a sudden, harsh laugh, his gaze flicking back to Bryony. "You didn't waste any time, did you, Madame Widow?"
Oh, yes, she had forgotten how mean Oliver could be.
"Only, you're not a widow,
Mrs. Wentworth."
He settled his hat on his head. "You're married to
me."
He stood up, his gaze raking the yard. "Where is Madeline? Get her."
For the first time Bryony noticed the men who stood, silent and watchful, outside their huts, down by the barns, in the door of the stables. Ann McBride was on the veranda, Simon still clutched in her arms. Only Mary Shanaghan and Madeline seemed to have disappeared.
Oliver brought his gaze back to her. There was a tight, unpleasant set to his lips that Bryony had never seen there before, and she thought that in some way the last two years had changed him, changed him a great deal. "Did you hear me, damn it? I said get her. We're leaving." He reached to seize Bryony's arm.
He never touched her. Hayden's fists closed around the
lapels of Oliver's impeccably tailored bottle-green coat and yanked the younger man almost off his feet.
"I told you to keep your hands off her." Hayden's voice was low and frighteningly even, and there was a gleam in his eyes that Bryony had never seen before.
This is a man who can kill,
she thought. Who
has
killed.
"Now,
I'm
going to let go of you, and you're going to get back on that horse of yours and ride out of here. Is that understood?"
One thing Oliver had never been, was a coward. Hayden might be larger and stronger and infinitely more skilled in the art of fighting, whether formal or dirty. But Oliver refused to cringe. He met the wintry frost of Hayden's eyes, and said, "I'll leave."
Hayden's fists opened. He took a step backward.
With fastidious care, Oliver shook out his coat and straightened his neck cloth. "I'll leave," he said again. He seized the chestnut's reins and swung up into the saddle. "But I'm only going as far as Green Hills. I'll be back. With a magistrate and troops, if necessary." He wrenched the chestnut's head around but paused a moment to look at Bryony over his shoulder. "You and Madeline are returning to Cornwall with me, Bryony. Willingly or not." Then he dug his heels into the chestnut's ribs and cantered away.
It was cold in the house, cold and quiet. The feeble warmth of the winter sunlight hadn't penetrated the thick walls. Hayden hunkered down before the fireplace in their bedroom, using an iron poker to stir the coals left from that morning. Bryony stood some distance away, staring blankly at the far wall and hugging herself. Except for one hand that kept running up and down, up and down her opposite arm, she was motionless.
He glanced at her again. She hadn't moved, hadn't looked at him, hadn't said a word. "Say something, damn it."
It came out louder and harsher than he'd intended. Her hand stopped its restless journey. She glanced at him, then away.
Why?
he wanted to shout. Why wouldn't she look at him? She couldn't possibly be wondering what
he
wanted, could she?
"What are we going to do?" she asked quietly.
He laid the poker on the hearth and reached for a fistful of kindling. His heart was wedged up somewhere near his throat, but he had to ask, had to know where he really stood with her. "That depends largely on what you want, doesn't it?"
"Hayden."
He heard the hurt in her voice, and was ashamed to discover he was glad of it. He remembered a night, long ago, when he had stood on the edge of his veranda, admiring the curve of her cheek bathed in the glow of moonlight and wanting so very much to take her into his arms and into his bed.
Did you love him very much?
he had asked. I
loved him,
she'd answered. The memory of it was like something twisting in his vitals. Something sharp and painful.