Page 62 of Her Duke By Accident
“Did you grow up happy, Lucy?”
“I don’t think so,” she replied with a frown.
Alicia pressed her lips together. “I am sorry.”
“Don’t be,” she whispered. “We are not all like you.”
“Lucy, my childhood was blessed in ways I will forever be grateful for… but being a happy child does not have to do with my parents loving one another.” She reached for the girl’s cold hands. “It helps, in a way, but I had my brother. He made my childhood happy. I was never alone. I had a guardian always looking over my shoulder. Like you had.”
“Me?”
“Well, of course,” Alicia said with an airy chuckle. “With Matthew.”
Lucy seemed to become pale. “I–I do not wish to speak of this anymore.”
“Why not, Lucy?”
“I do not wish to think of the life I could have had.”
“Talk to me,” Alicia whispered, “let me be?—”
“My mother?”
Alicia gaped at her. “Lucy, that’s not?—”
“I do not wish to speak of this anymore,” Lucy repeated in a small voice.
Alicia pulled her hands away from the girl and watched as she moved her horse on ahead of Ginger. There was a sinking sensation in her gut, as though bad tidings clung onto them close by. Before she could gather enough courage to speak, Lucy was a little ways ahead, her hair flowing in the wind once more.
“Let’s race,” the girl suddenly called out over her shoulder.
Alicia frowned. “Lucy?—”
Turning to look at her, Lucy looked entirely different. Flushed cheeks and a wild smile appeared on her lips. She grinned and giggled. “Let’s race, Alicia! To the back of the manor! Beside the garden! Renfield can judge.”
“I–I don’t even know if Renfield is there, Lucy!”
“Where else might the groundskeeper be?” she shouted with a laugh. “Race me, Alicia!”
Alicia sighed, not seeing any future in which she could beat the wild girl in an argument or a race. Besides, it had been years since her last horseback expedition, and she barely could cling onto Ginger’s rowdy self without giving the horse her full concentration.
“Go on ahead, Lucy,” Alicia shouted.
The girl laughed and shouted before urging Periwinkle on into a fast trot. The horse gave way to her commands easily, and then they were off to start the race. Alicia clung behind, not bothering to push Ginger out of her limits. They trotted slowly behind.
Alicia watched as Lucy raced ahead as though she were a professional rider, the determination even visible from behind her. Alicia smiled and felt at ease, hearing the birds talk and the wind coaxing its way through her hair.
Lucy wasn’t too far ahead when something triggered the instinct in Alicia’s stomach, this unbreakable tug that told her danger lurked around the corner. Alicia looked around, not seeing anything out of the ordinary in Garvey. There was only the manor in front of them, and the bar behind. And Lucy was right. Alicia could see Renfield’s tall self skulking in between the garden’s flowerbeds.
But then her eyes snapped to Lucy’s horse, and her heart almost stopped.
“Lucy!” she screamed.
The girl was too far gone to hear, too far gone to notice how her saddle grew looser and looser with each kick of Periwinkle’s legs.
“Wait! Lucy!” Alicia yelled again, but to no avail. She dug her heel into Ginger’s backside and urged her to push forward at a quicker pace. “Lucy!”
Snap!
