‘Don’t do anything dangerous, Your Grace.’Tillman cautioned as he passed her the reins.
‘I can’t promise,’ she replied, as she settled into the seat.‘Sometimes, the doing comes with danger.’
Lorelei tapped the horse’s sides.For the first few steps she swayed, as sitting mounted with her legs astride challenged the balance she’d learnt to maintain for the more genteel side saddle.A shout came from behind them, and she held on tighter, then squeezed her heels against the horse’s flanks in imitation of every damn nobleman she’d ever been forced to smile at and watch as they pranced along the drive.The horse moved into a trot.Once she’d adjusted to the jolt, and was fully seated, as the shouts turned to clapping feet against the stones, she tapped her heels again.The horse’s strides lengthened and smoothed into a canter.The rush of air smothered all shouts as the city fell away.They clattered past the tall, whitewashed houses, along narrow streets and past clusters of people, around corners, along boulevards, and between trees, until at last, the horse erupted into Hyde Park, swallowing grass and dirt with each stride.They careened across the winding paths and thoroughfares she knew from endless laps during her childhood, then back through the gates and onto the street.The horse’s hooves clapped against the stones, and their echo bounded off the walls along Avenue Road.Smooth, restrained and no doubt expertly trained, the stallion was a magnificent beast, far too good for the purpose of dragging a haughty old man around the city.As the houses thinned and the road shifted from stone to packed dirt, she gave her mount one final kick and let him have his full head.
Lorelei bent over the horse’s neck, gripping both mane and bridle, ignoring the pain of the leather rubbing against bare knees as she’d ignored so many other small pains over the course of her life.How many hours ahead would he be?Three or four, perhaps, but maybe,hopefully, less.If the carriage had sidetracked so her father could deliver a lecture before he’d sent off his grandson, that might have delayed their departure by at least an hour.They would have to rest to feed and water the horses at least once, twice if the driver was partial to a drink.And they wouldn’t be driving through the night, surely.They’d have to stop somewhere.
The moon threw ripples of white light into carriage ruts that had been gouged into occasional puddles while bare trees stuck gnarled branches into the sky.Every failure, every hesitation, every quiet deferral to men who said they knew better, each memory threw slander at her, and the faster she rode, the fiercer each accusation came.And while she raised rebuttals at each taunt, at every reprimand, telling herself she’d tried, how she’d been shouted down, that she had been too broken and too scared…
Eventually, she had to relent to their weight.
She should have dug deeper.Should have found her courage.
She hadn’t.
But after today, she would never let her son down.Not ever, ever again.
Lorelei curved her body to mould to the horse.‘A little faster, my friend,’ she urged, as she squeezed her knees against the stallion’s sides.‘I must find him myself.I must.’
Ahead, a sway of lights approached rapidly, accompanied by the jingle of bits and bridles.At last, the large body of a carriage emerged from the darkness.
‘Hold up!’she shouted, and pulled on the reins.They slowed to a canter, then a trot.‘In the name of the duke, stop!’
It was a far cry fromin the name of the king, but it had the same effect.The carriage eased its pace, and while it did not stop, Lorelei was able to pull up alongside and peer in through the window.There, curled into a corner, sat her son.‘Stop!’she shouted again.
‘The Duke of Stoneleigh said I’m to drive through to Manchester,’ the driver said with a hiccough and a sway.
Lorelei threw him a coin.‘Then drive through to Manchester.But my son is not going with you.’
With a huff and a grunt, and a mumble ofdamn toffsthe driver tugged on the reins, and the vehicle stopped.Lorelei swung off the horse, opened the door, pulled out the step, and hauled herself into the compartment.
‘Arley,’ she called into the dark carriage.‘Please look at me.’
He stayed crouched as he turned away.Rubbed at his neck.He was both man and boy.Her son and a stranger.
‘I’m sorry,’ she said, as clearly as she could through her heaving breaths.‘For so many things.For more than you can imagine.I will never forgive myself for sending you away, and I don’t expect you to forgive me either.But please come home.No more boarding.No more academy.I’ll hire tutors, or you can go to the local school if you prefer.You can quit school altogether and work in the fields if you really want.Just… just come home.I’ll never send you away again.I promise.’
Arley shifted.He placed a hand on the seat.Hesitated, his eyes searching hers.She could only hope that, somewhere, he remembered the mother she had been before she’d lost herself so.A single controlled sob escaped him.Then, face contorting with anguish and relief, he flung himself into her arms.He knocked her as light as a wind even though he was already taller than her.So thin she could feel his ribs through his coat.
‘Are you hungry?’she asked.
He nodded against her shoulder.‘Always.’
‘I’ll take you back to the townhouse.We’ll find you something to eat.’
That’s what mothers did, wasn’t it?They fed their sons?
Chapter ten
Somanytimesoverthe course of his life, Tillman had wondered why heaven had placed him with a crofter and a washerwoman yet provided a path to a privileged education.Why it had made him adept with numbers and words in a way that could have seen him prosper in the city while giving him a love of sunshine and open fields that meant he railed against such a thought.Why he had been given such simple beginnings only to spend his middle years within the layered complexities of class and privilege and hierarchy.Why, in a house full of lovely maids and working widows, in paddocks where hearty women stoked sheaves and brought sandwiches and ale out to their menfolk, he’d been destined to spend his days with one eye on the yield and another on the windows of the big house.Why he was always trying to catch a glimpse of a woman so far beyond his reach he’d have better luck trying to catch the moon than to even touch her hem.
But as Her Grace rode the horse she’d stolen from her father along her dead husband’s overgrown driveway, balancing her boy between her arms, both of them looking like they were about to drop from exhaustion, he could no longer question any of it.He did not even need an answer as to why.He was here.He had helped.That was enough.
No, not quite.
He had loved.
Andthatwas enough.
