She stopped herself before she said too much—in any other circumstances she would commend herself for the restraint, but she regretted it now. For all her talk of wanting to change the world, she wasn’t brave enough to admit that he’d changed her in such a short time, molded her heart around his solid form. And yet, she was too frightened to give up the future she’d planned with Lord Clements.
Because Will understood her, probably better than she understood herself, he heard the words she hadn’t said, and his expression softened. “Adelaide—”
A violent streak of lightning and accompanying boom rent the sky, sending them both staggering. Will gathered her close, surrounded her as a tree some distance ahead burst into flame and the ground shuddered beneath them. Phyllis brayed, bucked, and tugged at the cart in her effort to escape, but before Adelaide could move to reach the donkey, he held her back.
“She’s frightened and might hurt you,” he shouted over the driving rain and wind. Thunder rumbled high above them, and the smell of oxidized air and smoke burned her nostrils.
“I want to help, please!”
He caught her cheek in his massive hand, and the touch soothed her, siphoned the fear away. “I can’t let you get hurt,” he begged. “Please, I—I have to take care of you.”
The ache in her chest eased momentarily before it came back even stronger, but she pushed it aside to return to the cart and grab the bedroll and the provisions from the inn. By the time she returned to Will’s side, he’d released Phyllis from her harness and was guiding her away from the road, in the direction they’d come from.
“There was a barn across the field.” He had to yell to be audible over the wind. “We’ll be safe there.”
Together they pulled the reluctant beast over the mud-soaked, seemingly endless field, their destination unclear until she made out the edges of a whitewashed building through the driving rain. They were drenched, panting from exertion with muck up to their knees when Will slid the heavy door aside, guiding Adelaide and the donkey through before closing it behind them.
She dropped the bedroll and basket of food, then bent in half to recover—either from the escape from the storm or the pain of leaving Will. Both seemed determined to dig out her insides and leave them exposed to the elements. He turned to her, caught her shoulders in his hands and brought her to standing. “Are you hurt?”
“No,” she breathed, her lungs tight. “Merely winded, I think.”
His eyes passed over her, flared with heat, but he released her, threw his soaked hat and jacket to the ground before bending to tug off his mud-slicked boots.
Her throat clenched. “Will, what’s wrong?”
A silly question, aseverythingseemed wrong, and his low laugh suggested he agreed. When he stood up, his brows were drawn. “Do you believe in fate?”
Her lips parted at his non sequitur. “I—I don’t know. Do you?”
He shook his head and scoffed. “I didn’t, but since meeting you, since I signed on to this bloody trip, I’m starting to believe fate is out to get me.”
Indignation flared in her belly. “You think you’redestinedto be stuck with me and a donkey during a rainstorm in Somerset? I would expect the fates to have more important things to do.”
Her retort lost its heat as he approached her, examined her as though she were some vexing mystery he could not solve. “Everything has gone wrong since we met. One disaster after another, dragging me away from what I wanted and towardsyou.”
Her throat tightened. “I didn’t mean to make things difficult for you—”
“You didn’t make them difficult, you made themimpossible.” His large hands cupped her cheeks and forced her to meet his fiery gaze. “It’s impossible for me to want anything but you. I’ve stolen, lied—Christ, I ate dinner withcats, and all those things should make me want to run, as far and fast as I can.” His expression broke, and his chest heaved as he sucked in a breath. “But I don’t want that, not at all. I want to stay with you, by your side, as long as my heart is beating.”
The ache in her chest burst open into something intensely luminous, debilitating, and liberating at once. “Will, I—”
“But you’re marrying someone else.”
The words fell like the charred limbs of the tree by the roadside, lifeless but still capable of burning.
He swallowed hard before speaking again. “I can’t fight fate, Adelaide, but I also can’t keep you—keep both of us—from our futures. You need to write and change the world.”
Her voice shuddered as she spoke. “And you need to create something beautiful.”
He bent to press his forehead to hers, and their breath mingled in the preternatural silence of the barn. “Fate is cruel sometimes.”
She put her hands to his chest, the steady thrum of his pulse palpable against her palms. “But what if this is all random, just the universe in chaos? And our meeting was nothing but chance?”
His lips brushed her forehead, then her cheek. “I suspect nothing in the universe could have kept me away from you, even if I can’t keep you.”
When had tears started streaking down her cheeks like the rain outside? “You would have found me, somehow. I believe that.”
He kissed the tears away, and she tasted the salt on his lips when he brought them back to hers. “I would have found you anywhere.”
