James looked at the corridor wall and felt, for a moment, like he might crumble to ash.
"I'm going to take a horse," he said.
"I'll come."
"You don't have to."
"I'm coming," Daniel insisted. “Let me tell Cait where we’re headed."
"I'm not waiting." James started for the garden door. He’d foolishly waited too long as it was.
"James!" Daniel called after him.
But James was already heading for the stables and he did not slow his pace.
Cori pushed open the stable door.
The smell of horse and warm hay met her entrance. The horses turned their heads. Bread and Butter's mothers shifted in their stalls, and the foals looked at her with mild, unconcerned interest, blinking slowly in the lamplight.
Cori moved along the stalls slowly.
In the last stall, behind the larger of the two mares, in a nest of hay that had been arranged with great deliberation, lay little Lady Hannah Westham. Fast asleep.
Oh, thank heavens!
Cori sagged with relief.
In her nightrail and with her cloak pulled over her like a blanket, Hannah looked like the most peaceful of cherubs. Her blonde hair was tangled in the hay and she smiled in her sleep as though her dreams were pleasant. Curled against her stomach, Marmalade purred like the happiest of kittens.
Cori crouched down beside the child.
She gently pressed the back of her fingers to Hannah's cheek. Then she brushed the hair back from the girl's face. Hannah was breathing steadily, her color was good, and she was deeply, peacefully asleep. She had no idea she'd sent an entire castle full of people to the edges of their sanity.
The relief came out of Cori in one long breath.
She pushed back to her feet, and started for the exit. Everyone else at Acklan deserved to take the same relieved breath that Cori had done. She turned toward the stable door to go for the duke, and very nearly walked straight into him.
James pushed open the stable door.
He began immediately scanning the stalls for the nearest horse, calculating which animal was fastest, how long it would take to saddle and how much ground he could cover if he rode north toward the high moor while Turlow's men went east and Daniel came from the west...
Then Corinna Beckett came around the end of the last stall and nearly walked straight into him.
She stopped. He stopped. For a moment neither of them moved.
"She’s in the last stall," Miss Corinna said. "Behind the mare. She’s perfectly safe. She must’ve been asleep for hours."
James moved past her into the stall in question, the tightness in his chest lessening only once he saw his daughter.
Mother of God. He’d never been so scared in his life. He closed his eyes in silent thanks.
Then he started toward his daughter and the little orange kitten at her side. His movement must have alerted the cat because Marmalade opened one amber eye, but determined James was not his concern so he sleepily closed it again.
James crouched beside Hannah and put his hand against her cheek to make certain she was well.
She was warm and safe, and she sighed softly.
James stayed beside her for a moment, aware that Miss Corinna was just behind him. “Thank you for finding her,” he said, barely recognizing the raspiness of his own voice.
