This was the life she wanted.
One life; one love.
She’d never felt so at peace or complete . . . except for a still debated matter—
“You know, Breccan, if we did knock out that wall between our bedroom and the sitting room, we could have a nice nursery.”
There was a beat of silence while laughter filled his eyes.
“Aye,” he agreed. “Anything for you, love. Anything for you.”
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S
he wasn’t alone.
Sabrina Davidson went still. The low-ceilinged
shepherd’s hut, or bothy, was eerily quiet.
Too
quiet.
The sound of her own breathing roared in her ears.
She swallowed and held her breath, wanting to know why she sensed danger.
She should not be here. She should not have lost
her temper and stormed off from the Women’s Quarterly Meeting at the kirk. Of
course, she didn’t know if anyone had noticed her leaving. The ladies had all
been too involved in exclaiming over the Widow Bossley’s announcement that
Sabrina’s father, Mr. Richard Davidson, the local magistrate, had made her an
offer of marriage, and Sabrina had known nothing about it. She hadn’t even known
her father was keeping company with
any
woman of his
acquaintance let alone the most notorious widow in the valley.
What could he have been thinking?
And why
?
Her father didn’t need a new wife. Sabrina’s mother
had just recently died—well, it had been over a year, but he still wore his
black armband. He had declared to Sabrina he would never remarry and that, as
his sole daughter, her role was to care for him in his old age as she had tended
her mother in the long years of her illness.
While Sabrina’s friends and cousins had attended
valley socials and been courted, she had dutifully sat by her mother’s bedside.
As marriages were announced and children born, her only activities had involved
her parents’ wishes or charitable duties around the parish. She had performed
her tasks humbly. She’d resigned herself to her spinsterhood. She had accepted
that her lot in life was to be a helpmate to an important man like her father.
She’d told herself she was happy.
And she’d thought she was—until the Widow Bossley
had upended her life with her news, right there in front of everyone who was
anyone in the valley.
Sabrina had charged away as soon as she could leave
without drawing notice. She’d bypassed her pony cart, needing fresh air and
exercise to quell the riot of her emotions. She’d walked up Kenmore Hill,
heading out onto the moor, to a place where she could breath, where she could
think, and rant, and yell, and even curse without prying eyes.
This was all so humiliating.
Her father was not a demonstrative person, but
Sabrina had always believed he respected and valued her. Now she realized he
thought of her as little more than a servant. She was only a daughter, a being
inferior to his sons, who were out in the world
living full
lives
.
And what could she do now? She was trapped. She was
too old to marry. She’d never had a gentleman caller. They had all been
interested in her beautiful cousins and other girls who didn’t have a sick
mother and an overbearing father. Girls who could flirt and dance and laugh and
didn’t have the weight of the world upon their shoulders.
Sabrina had ducked into the bothy before she’d
started screaming her frustration and rage. Even here on the lonely hillside,
one must be careful of appearances. The habit was deeply ingrained in her.
The hut was two small rooms practically built into
the hillside. It was an unassuming building, one meant to offer only the most
rudimentary shelter, and could have been easily overlooked from the road. She’d
quickly marched right to the farthest corner of the second room, ready to
unleash her fury over an unjust, uncaring world, when she’d had the first
inkling she was not alone.
She slowly turned toward the doorway, her eyes
scanning the close quarters of the room as if someone lingered in a corner ready
to pounce upon her. In those tense seconds, every story she’d ever heard of
robbery and murder ignited her imagination. As the magistrate’s daughter, she’d
heard more than her share.
However, all was still. She was alone.
A bird chirped from outside, and then there was the
flapping of wings against a shabby thatched roof that appeared ready to cave in
at any moment.
Sabrina released her breath. “A bird. How silly of
me.” She raised her hands to her head, resting the heels of her palms against
her temples as she struggled with good sense. This was silly. She was must
return to the kirk. She shouldn’t have walked off. She’d been gone at least
thirty minutes and her absence would be noted.
Besides, she had to return to collect her pony
cart. And her coat. Her gloves. Her hat.
She’d probably meet the Widow Bossley when she went
back. That was the way of such matters. One always ran into the person she’d
most like to avoid. Sabrina did not want to talk to her.
However, she had more than a few choice words for
her father, words she didn’t know if she had the courage to speak. Anything that
threatened to come out of her mouth right now would be very angry, and her
father was not the sort to respond well to questions.
She lowered her hands. She didn’t like scenes. She
prided herself on being unflappable, but the members of the Women’s Quarterly
Meeting were shrewd. They never missed a trick, and many would know she’d been
surprised by the Widow Bossley’s news. Gossip would fly through the valley, and
Sabrina’s pride did not like the idea. Still, she needed to keep her chin up.
Her pride demanded it.
With a resolute sigh, Sabrina started to walk into
the bothy’s outer room when a strong hand reached out from the side of the door
and clamped down on her wrist.
Sabrina’s scream was cut short as her body was
forcibly whirled around and slammed into the rough stone wall hard enough to
knock the wind from her.
A man leaned against her, a huge man with broad
shoulders and a jaw covered with several days’ growth of beard. “What are you
doing here?” he demanded, his voice a guttural sound. His eyes burned with
menace. His breath was hot.
Sabrina stuttered, unable to make a word come out.
His body weight was hot and heavy upon her.
The man studied her a moment as if trying to read
her soul. His face was feverishly flush, his expression grim—and just when she
expected him to put his hands around her neck, he stepped back. Sabrina was so
surprised by his abrupt move, she started to slide down the wall to the ground,
her knees almost too weak to hold her weight.
“
Go
,” he ground out.
“But don’t tell anyone you saw me. Do you understand? Not a word.” He was Irish.
She could hear it in his voice.
Sabrina shook her head, so thankfully relieved he
was offering her freedom she would have promised him anything. She pushed off
the wall and stumbled toward the door.
The man watched her. She could feel his eyes, and
then she heard him crash to the ground.
She should have kept running.
She didn’t.
Sabrina turned. He was sprawled out, face down.
Sweat dampened his dark hair into curls around his brow. He wore a soldier’s
uniform . . . and he was younger than her first impression. He was
close to her age of eight and twenty.
He was also very ill. She realized that now. He had
appeared feverish because he was.
A wise woman would have run out the door. Sabrina
didn’t. She had a gift for healing. Hours spent tending her mother had given her
training. She sensed that if she left this man the way he was, he would die.
Sabrina took a step toward him, and then
another.
He did not move.
She knelt beside him and felt his brow. His skin
was on fire. “You need help, sir,” she said. She glanced around the room and
noticed a pallet in the room’s dark corner. If she hadn’t been so wrapped up in
her own thoughts, she would have noticed it when she first entered the
bothy.
“I need to take you to a doctor,” she continued,
weighing her options. He was too big a man for her to carry or drag. “I will go
for help.”
She started to rise but then his hand reached out
and grabbed her leg around the ankle. He may have been ill but his grip was
strong. She teetered.
He looked up at her. His eyes were blue, like two
sharp pieces of stained glass. “No,” he managed, his breathing heavy. “Can’t let
anyone know I’m here.” There was a beat of silence and then he whispered,
“Please.” He dropped his head back to the stone floor and let go of her
ankle.
Sabrina danced backwards. The man had closed those
disconcerting eyes. They had a power about them. “You will die without help,”
she warned him.
He didn’t answer. He’d lost consciousness.
She knew she should make her escape. She should
tell Reverend Kinnion that the man was here. The reverend would know what to do.
He’d probably organize a party of men from around the Kenmore Inn.
Or she could tell her father. Magistrates always
knew what to do.
But the Irishman didn’t want anyone to know he was
here, and he might have a very good reason. She should fetch help
. . . but she wouldn’t. There had been desperation in that single word
“Please.”
Sabrina was not intuitive. She believed in what she
could see, touch, and reason. Even her acceptance of the Almighty was sometimes
challenged by those of a more superstitious nature.
However, in this moment, she made a decision to
honor the Irishman’s request, and she could not say why other than it was
something she felt she must do.
Sabrina began coaxing him back to his pallet. His
body was a dead weight so she gave up and picked up the heavy wool coat that
served as his bed and placed it over him. A hat, a black leather tricorn favored
by soldiers, was his pillow.
He needed good broth and a poultice of herbs,
although it could be too late. He was very ill.
Sabrina spun on her heel and charged out the door,
filled with a purpose that gave wings to her step. Her father would not approve
of her tending a strange man. The gossip in the valley would fly if the Women’s
Quarterly Meeting had any idea what she planned, but she had no intention of
sharing information about this man.
For the first time in her memory, Sabrina felt
engaged in life. She had purpose.
Besides, her father had kept secrets about the
Widow Bossley from her.
Well, now she had a secret to keep from him.
CATHY MAXWELL spends hours in front of her computer pondering the question, “Why do people fall in love?” It remains for her the great mystery of life and the secret to happiness. She lives in beautiful Virginia with children, horses, dogs, and cats.
Fans can contact Cathy at www.cathymaxwell.com or PO Box 1135, Powhatan, VA 23139.
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The Brides of Wishmore
The Chattan Curse
Temptation of a Proper Governess
The Seduction of an English Lady
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, organizations, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
Excerpt from
The Groom Says Yes
copyright © 2014 by Catherine Maxwell, Inc.
THE BRIDE SAYS MAYBE
. Copyright © 2014 by Catherine Maxwell, Inc. All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the nonexclusive, nontransferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, decompiled, reverse-engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins e-books.
EPub Edition MARCH 2014 ISBN: 9780062219282
Print Edition ISBN: 9780062219275
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