Page 3 of Make My Wish Come True
Not a cat. Cats made him sneeze. He looked into her hopeful but worried face and said, “Collect him quickly. The horses are waiting.”
The smile that blazed across her face landed like a blow to his chest, and she whirled around him and out the door without another word. He caught the flash of trim ankles as she hiked up her skirts to run. The landlady saw, and she gave Adrian a narrow-eyed look. He touched his hat to her, and pulled the door closed behind him.
It was several miles still to Blackthorpe. He surveyed the sky as he walked back to the chariot, his boots crunching on the thin layer of snow that had fallen since he arrived. In fine weather, he’d expect to be home by dinner. Today, he wasn’t so sure.
He put the valise into the carriage boot. “A moment,” he told the postilion who stood, hands tucked under his elbows, next to the horses’ heads.
“Can’t wait long in this cold,” the fellow warned.
Adrian looked around and finally caught sight of the young woman, down on her hands and knees in front of the stable. She seemed to be pleading, and finally a large orange cat strolled out and jumped into her basket. Adrian tore his gaze away from her nicely-shaped bottom. She was still fumbling with the straps on the basket when she hurried up beside him.
“I’m ready,” she said breathlessly. The cold had brought spots of pink into her cheeks and her eyes were bright with eagerness.
“Very good,” he told her, and handed her up into the chariot, trying not to allow his hand to linger on her back. He nodded to the postilion, already in the saddle, and climbed in. He was still pulling the door closed as the horses set off, shaking their heads and snorting against the cold.
* * *
Gwen could not believe she was doing this.
She’d just got into a carriage with a strange man and set off, alone with him, bound for who-knew-where. She’d only his word that he was going to Blackthorpe; she hadn’t even thought to ask the postilion where they were headed. Not that the postilion could be considered a truly objective or even benign presence, as he was being paid by the stranger.
But she’d hardly have been better off refusing, left to spend the night alone in an unfamiliar inn, possibly sleeping in the public taproom. In the morning, she would still have little money and no companion, and she’d learned that a public coach was no protection against being groped, leered at, and generally harassed.
She glanced sideways at her companion. The chaise wasn’t large, but he was keeping to his side of the carriage as much as possible. He was currently wrestling with a thickly folded blanket, and having an awkward time of it, in the cramped quarters.
“Thank you, sir,” she said. “I probably ought not to have accepted, but… I am desperate to get back to Gran.” She cocked her head. “How did you know she was ill?”
He was frowning fiercely at the blanket. “You were weeping,” he said absently. “At the delay. I guessed it must be an urgent reason spurring you to make a long journey at this time of year, in this weather, and that seemed a likely one.” He put his arms straight out and gave a mighty shake, and the blanket finally fell in loose folds. He cleared his throat, then gingerly moved it toward her. “Here,” he told her. “The hot bricks will be cold before long.”
Oh yes; she hadn’t even noticed the hot bricks under her feet. Feeling even more kindly disposed toward him, she tucked the blanket around herself, realizing then that it was the only one. “Oh no,” she said in alarm. “You’ll be cold.”
He wrapped his long gray cloak around himself. “Nonsense. After sleeping in a tent in the mountains of Spain, this is remarkably cozy.”
“Oh.” She hesitated. “I don’t even know your name. I am Guinevere Barrett.”
He gave her that fleeting little smile again. “A pleasure to make your acquaintance, Miss Barrett. Captain Fitzhugh, at your service.”
She blushed as he caught her fingers and gave them a brief press.
“Barrett.” His eyes stayed on her face. They were a deep dark brown, like coffee, and his gaze felt warm. “I don’t know that name. Has your family been long in Blackthorpe?”
She blew out a breath. “No. It’s only my grandmother who lives there, with her sister at Larkspur Cottage. I’ve never been.”
His brow quirked. “I thought you must be very close to her…”
“Oh, I am,” she assured him. “She raised me from the time I was twelve. My mother died, and my father… well, he was not prepared or able to manage a growing girl. So he left me with Gran in Norwich.” She paused, reminding herself he was a stranger and surely had no interest in her life, but somehow she found herself telling him anyway. “It was best for us all. My grandfather had died the year before, and I think I must have distracted Gran from missing him, though not always for admirable reasons!” She grimaced and gave a rueful little laugh as she admitted it.
Her companion nodded. “It’s a difficult age, even without losing a parent—let alone both of them.”
Gwen’s throat tightened for a moment. Yes, she’d lost her father, too, to the bottomless bottle of gin he’d fallen into after Mama’s death. She didn’t want to think about that now. “I haven’t been able to visit Gran often in the last few years. She didn’t like to be alone, after I was grown, so she went to live with her sister in Blackthorpe.”
“That, I understand.” He smiled again. He had a very warm smile. A beautiful mouth. She found herself smiling back. “My father died when I was about that age and my grandfather had to step in, too, with me and my brother. We were proper little hellions, I think, and would have driven our mother to distraction.” He gave her an impish look, his dark eyes shining, and she knew at once how he must have looked as a boy, trying to evade punishment for a prank. “Thanks to old Boney, I haven’t seen my grandfather in a few years, either.”
“That’s terrible,” she said sincerely.
“No, no,” he replied. “We’ve pushed the French out of the Peninsula. Grandfather will mightily approve.”
“Oh, that was very well done,” she said quickly. “But I’m sorry it had to be done at all, taking so many men like you away from their families.”
