Page 82 of Her Wicked Highwayman
For a long moment Diana stared at Caddington’s body, almost unable to believe he was dead, that this monster who’d haunted Rafe’s nightmares was finally, truly gone.
“Come on!” Caspian said. “We must move.”
The three of them carried Rafe down to the waiting wagon.
Diana sat in the hay beside Rafe, who was lying upon his stomach. Will drove the horses in a half circle until they were back onto the road and away from that dark and awful place—away from death. Lord Lennox sat on the other side of Rafe inthe back of the wagon. The slow light of dawn illuminated his face.
“Tell me everything—please. I need the truth, all of it,” Lennox pleaded with Diana. She let out a shaky breath and told Ashton everything.
“I met Rafe when he held up the coach I was on. He was pretending to be a Scotsman named Tyburn...”
She left out nothing, not even the fact that she and Rafe had made love more than once. She confessed that she had also taken up robbery using Tyburn’s identity to save her family home, learning about the story of Malcolm Lennox’s death, and how Caddington had formed an unnatural fixation on Rafe all those years ago.
“My father must have gone back into the tavern after trying to send Rafe home,” said Lennox. “He must’ve known Rafe was in danger and wanted to stop Caddington. But he was attacked by one of the wenches and robbed. That blow to his head left him disoriented when I found him. He wasn’t thinking clearly when he saw Rafe across the street from us. I tried to stop him from crossing, but... I couldn’t. What happened that night couldneverbe Rafe’s fault. I never truly believed Rafe killed him, but in my grief and anger I told him I did, and shame kept me from taking back those words. Christ, he was only a child, though in truth I was not much older. It was easier to put my fury and blame on him.” He dragged a hand over his weary face.
“How old were you?” Diana asked.
“I was fifteen, a young man, I . . .”
She put a hand on his arm. “You were a child too. I believe it’s time for the Lennox men to stop blaming themselves, and each other, for what was an accident.”
Lennox smiled then, the expression fond. “No wonder my brother is madly in love with you. I’m glad for it. He deserves someone to be his champion after so long.”
His unexpected praise hit her heart in a most tender place.
“What will happen now?” Diana asked after a moment. “Now that Caddington and Phelps are dead? We killed them.” Diana met his weary gaze. She didn’t want to think about the legal ramifications or the emotional ones of having taken a life, but it was something neither of them could avoid.
Lennox took a moment before replying. “I learned a long time ago that sometimes the only way to stop evil is to remove its pieces from the chessboard. Then it cannot make any more moves against you and it cannot hurt you. I will speak to the king as well as the Lord High Chancellor and tell them what happened. George will listen to me. I have not worked all these years without the means to garner his favor and have something like this go my way. If it helps, I will take Phelps’s death on my own as well.”
“No, my lord, you mustn’t?—”
Ashton held up a hand. “Let me do this for you, for the woman my brother loves. The woman who will cherish both him and his child. You are now under the protection of the house of Lennox.” In that moment, the already striking lord became a knight of old, his vow moving over her, leaving goosebumps on her skin.
They looked down at the bloody ravaged stripes on Rafe’s back, and Ashton’s face hardened.
“I wish that I could strike that devil down a thousand times over for what he’s done.”
Diana, who would never have considered herself a bloodthirsty creature, agreed. He was right. Evil did not belong on the chessboard.
“If...When,” Ashton corrected himself. “When Rafe is feeling better, I shall let you marry straightaway by special license, no more delays. Lord knows you’ve both had enough challenges in your lives. I won’t add one more to the list.”
“Thank you,” Diana whispered. Though in truth she didn’t care about the wedding. She only wanted Rafe to be all right, to see him smiling at her, to let him tease her and feel his lips on hers and his body wrapped around hers at night. Neither of them would ever be alone again if only he would be all right. She stroked Rafe’s sweat-dampened hair and silently urged Will to make the horses go faster.
Hold on, my love . . . hold on.
CHAPTER 19
All of Lennox House was awake when the wagon rolled to a stop. Half a dozen footmen ran down the steps to meet them. Diana watched anxiously as Rafe was carried inside. Joanna, Regina, and Rosalind were at the entryway, along with Mrs. Chesterfield, who held Isla’s hand. The little girl watched her father with tear-filled eyes as he was carried past her up the stairs. She clutched her little doll to her chest and made not one sound.
It was the child’s silence that broke through the state of numbness Diana had drifted into, pushing her into action. Isla shouldn’t see Rafe like this, bloodied, broken, fighting for his life. She rushed over to the child and hoisted her up into her arms, turning the girl’s face away and cupping the back of her head with one hand. Isla trembled in her arms, just as she had that day they’d been trapped in the storm.
“It’s all right, my little darling. It will be all right, you’ll see,” she promised the girl. She would do whatever she had to do to keep that promise, for both of them. “Mrs. Chesterfield, would you get some warm milk and biscuits? I’m taking Isla back to the nursery. She should be in bed, resting.”
“No!I want to stay. Please?” The little girl curled her arms tight around Diana’s neck. Such a strong protective instinct surged up within Diana, as though this child was truly hers to love and protect forever.
Diana brushed the girl’s curls away from her face. “I know, my darling. But this is not a memory you should have of your father. I’ll make sure you see him the moment he feels better.”
She carried Isla to the nursery and had just reached the top of the stairs when Brock and the village doctor raced past them. Neither man said a word as they passed, hurrying instead to Rafe’s room.
