“She was shot in the back of her shoulder.But she’ll be fine,” Adam said.“The doctor said she’d need plenty of rest.”
Elizabeth breathed a sigh of relief.“Where is she?”
“At Four Oaks.”
“What about Captain Lee?”Jonathan asked.
“Though Jean didn’t personally see the blackguard die, Jewel told him that Lee had drowned in the inlet trying to save his precious treasure chest.”
“Good riddance,” Jonathan said, trying to ignore the rocking of the carriage.
“Yes, you could say that,” Adam said with a nod as he shifted, trying to find a more comfortable position.“There was a long line of people who wanted to kill that bloody bastard!”Adam propped his arm on the window and looked out.“I beg your pardon, Elizabeth.”
“You could probably put me on that list, too,” Elizabeth murmured, more to herself than to anyone.
Jonathan managed to put his arm around her.“That’s my tigress.”He chuckled.“Do you realize, my love, that out of the four of us, you are the only one who hasn’t been shot?I guess I can be thankful that you were not hurt.”
Elizabeth forced a smile, but when she glanced at Adam she saw the compassion in the eyes that were so much like her own.Seeing the sympathy brought moisture to her eyes.She didn’t want Jonathan to see, so she turned to gaze out the carriage window.The past would be something she’d have to live with for the rest of her life.
She glanced at Jonathan.“Yes, I was the lucky one,” she whispered.“Now put your head on my shoulder.”She gave him a small smile.“You need to rest.”
Turning back to the window, she stared out at the trees stripped bare by chilly winter winds.Gray puddles dotted the road.At least it had stopped raining, but it was cold—just like she felt inside.Yes, she was the lucky one.She’d not been shot, but she had been wounded.
Deeply.
Elizabeth sighed.She wasn’t a meek little lamb who would run and hide.She was a fighter like her brother.
She would lick her wounds.And she would survive.
But she could not bring herself to tell Jonathan ...at least not yet.
Finally,the carriage swung into the lane that led up to Four Oaks.A row of live oaks lined both sides of the road, lacing their branches together in an overhead canopy.The carriage topped the rise and the white mansion, surrounded by four huge oak trees draped in Spanish moss, appeared before them.
Elizabeth had come to think of Four Oaks as home.It wasn’t as large as their childhood home, Briercliff, in Cornwall, but it was warm and inviting with its stately beauty.
Eight Corinthian pillars graced the front of the house, and wisteria vines draped the two at the ends.On a warm, sunny day you could hear the constant hum of bees darting from flower to flower.But the cold winter days of the present season left the vines bare and the bees quiet.
Elizabeth missed Briercliff, where she and Adam had grown up playing in those castle halls.Briercliff sat on the gray cliffs of Cornwall, and Elizabeth had always thought of the magnificent estate fondly, because that was where she remembered her parents.If she shut her eyes, she could picture her mother’s beautiful face and her breathtaking, laughing blue eyes.Elizabeth and Adam had taken after both their parents and ended up with unusual slate-gray eyes.She supposed it was a mixture of their father’s black eyes and their mother’s blue ones.She wished her parents had lived long enough to see how she and Adam had grown up.She hoped they would have been proud of their children, and she wished she could have asked her mother’s advice about how to handle her present situation.
The carriage lumbered to a stop, halting Elizabeth’s daydreaming.She noticed Jonathan had fallen asleep on her shoulder.
“Sit still, Elizabeth.I’ll get someone to help me get Jonathan to a room,” Adam said.“He’s going to need plenty of rest before he’s back to his old self.”Her brother swung down out of the carriage.
Elizabeth watched her brother march up the front steps of Four Oaks.She glanced down at the face of the man she loved.
She and Jonathan had grown up together in England.But back then she was nothing more than an annoyance to him.He’d always called her Adam’s little sister even though she and Adam were the same age.
However, over the years her place in his life had changed to something else ...something more.She smiled.She had noticed how Jonathan had stared at her when she’d left England to come to America.It was a peculiar stare...as if he’d wanted to say something, but couldn’t.That in itself was unusual for Jonathan.He was devilish in every way and never at a loss for words.
She’d heard the stories about him in England—the ocean wasn’t that big!Jonathan Scott Winston Hird, Earl of Longdale, had become a rake.She wondered just how many hearts he had broken.Of course, Jonathan would let them down easy, but their hearts would be broken all the same.
She hadn’t known what to expect when Jonathan had come home this last time.Did he remember her?Would he care?
Lifting her hand, she gently brushed a stray lock of sandy brown hair from his forehead.The warmth of his soft flesh was intoxicating, and she longed to have him hold her.
Elizabeth had loved Jonathan all her life.At first the love she felt had been the love of a child, but it had endured over the years and had grown stronger.When Jonathan followed Adam across the ocean, and she’d finally seenhimagain as a man, from the perspective of a woman, she knew.For a brief moment before Jonathan had hidden it, she had seen his love.He had looked at her with such a yearning, it had made her heart ache with longing, and she’d made up her mind then and there that Jonathan’s bachelor days were numbered.
Adam leaned in the carriage door and grabbed Jonathan’s good arm.“You’ve had enough time with my sister.Let’s get you upstairs.”
