Seth’s voice so soothing, his embrace so warm and comforting, that she could but nod, Kari knowing she had been wholly taken by surprise when Caleb lifted the gun to his head.
No, not Caleb, she told herself, the bodice of her dress still wet from his tears.
Her father.
Calling him Papa still echoed in her mind, his inconsolable cries for forgiveness still making her want to weep herself. His red-rimmed eyes had moved from her face to Seth’s, her father reaching up to desperately clutch his hand as if begging him for mercy, and then to Molly and her husband. Meanwhile, servants and what few guests hadn’t fled out the front door to their carriages stood watching in stunned silence just outside the dining room.
Finally Seth and Charles had helped him to his feet and half-carried him upstairs to his room, where Seth’s father still attended to him and Molly remained at his bedside along with Reverend Thomas.
Only Seth’s insistence that she accompany him outside for some air had made Kari leave him just moments ago. Her father intoning hoarsely over and over, “Lara, stay…don’t leave me,” made her fear that what had happened had broken him and he was losing his mind.
A shiver coursed through her, not of fear but sheer amazement. Had he seen her mother’s face, too? Was that why her father kept repeating Lara’s name? Heaven help her, how was she to make sense of it?
“Uncle Caleb’s strong, Kari, he’ll recover,” Seth murmured, guessing the direction of her thoughts. Then he sighed heavily. “As for him pleading for forgiveness, only time will tell if he truly meant it. We can hope.”
She nodded, still stunned that her father would have arranged a marriage for her without her consent after he’d been so solicitous of her while she recuperated. He had given no indication that such a thing was on his mind when he’d visited her while bedbound, instead telling her stories about his grandparents founding Walker Creek in what had then been the Republic of Texas.
He’d also relayed about his forebears fighting off Indian attacks, which no doubt had fueled his prejudice against Seth—yet Seth had said her father had once laughed and played with him until he’d received that letter from her mother. Oh, how she hoped that Caleb had undergone a change of heart, please Lord, let it be so!
“Kari, I have something to tell you.”
She glanced up at Seth, half of his face in shadow and the other illuminated from the light shining from the window, her breath stilling at how somber he looked.
“That’s why I brought you out here, so we could talk alone.”
He released her and took a step back from her, which made Kari feel as if everything had stopped around her, her heart suddenly clamoring in her breast.
Was he preparing to go down on one knee and propose to her? Though they were no longer embracing, he held both her hands tightly, her fingers begun to tremble.
“I must also ask for your forgiveness.”
Forgiveness? Expecting him to have said something else entirely, she felt a rush of disappointment, blurting, “If it’s about you going away without saying goodbye, I knew you must have a good reason—”
“No good reason, I’m ashamed to admit. Remember when you asked me if I was courting you to spite my uncle?”
Kari gaped at him, her heart plummeting into her slippers as she sensed what he was about to say.
“I was going to deny it, but that wouldn’t have been the truth. Ihadthought of how good it would feel to see my uncle’s face when he heard the news, but that wasn’t at the heart of me wanting to court you—”
“Oh, Seth, no.” Kari took a step back from him, though he still held fast to her hands. “First my father intended to marry me off to someone I don’t love…and now you planned to use me as well to get back at him?”
“That’s not what I said at all—Kari, what in blazes?”
She’d yanked her hands away so abruptly that she staggered backward, but caught herself on a porch swing. Not soon enough, though, to prevent a sharp twinge in her ankle. Wincing, she tried to brush past him, but Seth pulled her into his arms.
“Kari, listen to me! I know it wasn’t right, that’s why I’m asking your forgiveness! I was so disgusted with myself that I rode out of here as fast as I could, but I should have come to see you instead and told you the truth. I said tonight that I love you, and I do! From the moment I saw you, I knew you were the woman I’ve been waiting for—”
“And surely no better one to wield like a knife against your uncle! Let go of me, Seth!Let go!”
He did so reluctantly, his face darkened even in the dim light while Kari felt blinded by the tears welling in her eyes. Yet she choked them back and rushed to the front door as a deafening crack of thunder made the house seem to shake.
Out of the corner of her eye she saw Seth start to come after her, but then another ominous thunderclap and the wind picking up made him turn instead and run down the steps.
From a distant barn she heard the frantic whinnying of horses, Seth disappearing into the night as Kari ducked inside and slammed the door behind her.
Chapter 10
Lucius running as fast as his spindly bowlegs would carry him toward Seth was warning enough that what he’d feared had already happened.
