He was going to become a husband. Today. He was going to beAra’s husband. He grinned into the night as he waited, knowing he was an hour ahead of their appointed meeting time. He had been unable to remain at Brixton Hall a moment longer, knowing the rest of his life awaited him. She had his heart. Now and forever.
She was his fate.
The sudden, soft crunch of a footfall behind him alerted him he wasn’t alone.
Before he could react, violent pain slammed through his skull, accompanied by the sickening sound of something heavy and hard connecting with his flesh. A thousand tiny stars swirled before him.
Bloody hell, was he being robbed?What in the hell? Who in the hell?
He reached out, his mind swimming with agony and confusion. He was blinded, off-kilter. He tried to grope for his attacker. Met with empty air. Another swing of the weapon hissed through the air, landing on his already battered head. He raised his arms, trying to deflect the blows that kept coming. But he was slow, his body sluggish and weak from the grueling pace he had set for himself. From shock and surprise and the effect of the blows he’d suffered.
Another.
He fell to his knees.
Another.
The world went black. He pitched forward into nothing, and his last thought was of Ara. He had to protect her. He had to keep her safe. But the blackness called, and the anguish was a tide, pulling him under.
Today was theday. The first day in the rest of her life. The best day.No, scratch that.It was the beginning of the best of her days.
She was going to be a wife.
Clay’s wife.
Mrs. Clayton Ludlow.
Ara’s hands shook as she retrieved her small valise from its hiding place beneath her bed. Small enough to carry. Large enough to contain a few of her most precious possessions: her journal, a simple gown, undergarments, two pairs of stockings, and Volume II of Elizabeth Barrett Browning’sPoems, the match to the volume she’d given Clay.
She was early, she knew. Clay had instructed her to meet him at dawn, which would not yet arrive for another hour. But in the dark stillness of Kingswood Hall, so much change about to unfurl, she could not sleep.
Energy quaked inside her like a spring blossom prepared to burst forth and bloom. In the time since they had parted, she had done her best not to show a hint of the tumult rioting inside her—the sheer, unadulterated joy. As she breakfasted alongside her mother and father, she wondered if they noticed a difference in her.
She wondered if her smiles were too bright, too wide, if she seemed too eager, too carefree. Too alive. She feared they could sense the love burning inside her, filling her, overwhelming her. Transforming her. Changing her from Araminta, proper and well-behaved, dutiful daughter, into Ara.
Ara was the woman who found love like a wild rose thriving amidst weeds and plucked it to make her own. Ara was brave and bold. She was the one who left Kingswood Hall in the night and wrapped herself in the arms of her lover. She was the one who dared.
And Ara was loved. She was going to make a happier life for herself than her mother and her sister had found. One of her own choosing. One of her own making. She did not need a title or wealth. All she needed was Clay and his large, reassuring body, his knowing hands, his gentle strength, his tenderness. His teasing.
His kisses.
His love.
How she adored his mouth. His fingers. His dark hair, the scruff of his beard, the scuff on his boots. He was going to behers. Hers to touch and love, though it still seemed an impossible fantasy as she made one more cursory check of the items she had stowed inside her valise.
But it was true.
She was going to be a wife.
Clay’s wife.
Mrs. Clayton Ludlow.
No matter how many times the thoughts rained through her mind, she could not seem to imagine the reality of it. The bliss of being free to be with the man she loved. Of no longer having to hide in forests and hunting cabins, living for the night and the darkest hour when no one would discover what she was doing or where she was going.
She sat down on the edge of her bed, valise at her side, and waited.
He woke tohis hands bound. To the sting of a cold metal blade on his cheek. To the lash of something tight around his chest and waist. To the scent of stale sweat and gin and old boots.
