“I suppose I’m the best person to tell,” he said, happy to play along. “I mean, if I go to the police and turn you in, I’m not doing myself any favours, am I?”
His joke brought a smile to her face as she squeezed his fingers.
“I fought him off,” she said. “He was smaller than me, and the drink had made him unsteady. He’d been forcing himself on me, when I kicked him off and ran. I didn’t dare look back. I thought I’d heard him yelling after me, but it was so confusing.”
Maddy stopped for a moment, those last moments a horrible blur she could no longer recall with clarity.
“The next day the local constable was at our door,” she continued. He’d been found dead from a wound to the side of his temple. I must have pushed him harder than I thought.”
“That wasn’t your fault,” he said, putting his hand to her face. “You did what any man would have done. Defend yourself.”
“I wasn’t going to let anyone hurt me anymore.”
Something in Beau swelled then, fierce and protective. It was as if he’d never made a vow before—and maybe he hadn’t. But he was never going to let anyone hurt Madeline Murray. Never again. If it cost him every last cent, every scrap of his self-worth.
“Is that why you look after those girls at Everwell?” he asked.
“Partially,” she said. “They need someone to look after them.”
“And who looks after you?” Because I want to. He would look after her until his last breath.
“My fellow spinsters,” she said. “We all look after each other, in our own way.”
He wanted so badly to put his lips to her exposed shoulder and taste her skin, which was starting to turn pink under the sun. Instead, he got to his feet, looked around for her clothes and boots, and presented them to her.
“Well, I’m going to look after you,” he said, ignoring the curious glance. “At least for the rest of the afternoon. As much as I would personally love to see you in nothing but your drawers, I don’t feel prepared to answer to any of the Chandlers if one of them came back this way looking for a stray ewe.” He gave her his best cocky smile, and to his great delight, a blush crept up the side of her face.
Even though they’d just been side by side, she insisted he turn around until she was dressed.
“There,” she said, button up the last button on her blouse. “I’m ready. I’m eager to see the pergola.”
There was something about her not-quite-put-together appearance that threatened to drive him wild, but this was not the time for him to be thinking with what was in his pants.
“Much as I would be thrilled to dazzle you with my carpentry skills,” he said, “I’ve got something else to show you. Are you ready for a little adventure, my lady?”
Chapter Seventeen
Anticipation hung in the air as Maddy looked at his outstretched fingers. Taking his hand felt dangerous in a way she couldn’t quite articulate. But she had just confessed all to him, hadn’t she? Somehow, Beau had become a safe place to share some of the most horrible pieces of herself. Her worst memories. And that brought a lightness she hadn’t expected.
Taking a breath, she put her hand in his. As he wrapped his fingers around hers, the feeling of his warm, masculine hands, so foreign and yet so unbelievably right, reached deep inside her. Just like how the sun’s strength would touch her flowers, encouraging them to unfurl their petals.
He led her up the foot path, through the wood, until they reached the clearing. But instead of guiding her back toward the house, he turned in the opposite direction, where the elaborate root system at the base of a fallen tree formed a natural wall. He guided her around it, taking care that she not catch her foot on a root.
“Where are you taking me?” she asked, as her curiosity started to get the best of her. The scent of clover filled the air as the wildflowers and grasses danced lazily in the summer breeze. The path underneath their feet was thick with grasses, but alongside she noticed the suggestion of a stone formation, almost like a little ha-ha wall. She was about to point it out to him when he stopped. For a moment, she feared he would let her go, and Maddy could not help the relief that he apparently had no intention of doing so.
“Almost there,” he said, smiling at her with a giddiness she could only recall seeing in the eyes of the Everwell students on Christmas Eve. “In fact, I want you to cover your eyes.”
“Beau da Silva,” Maddy said, not bothering to disguise her incredulity at his request. “Perhaps I have just read too many novels or penny dreadfuls. But going with a strange man into the woods, blindfolded, generally doesn’t work out well for most women.”
“I am hardly a stranger,” he said, putting a hand to his heart with that characteristic flair she was, despite herself, coming to adore. “And what are you reading? Clearly not A Midsummer Night’s Dream. Or Snow White.”
Maddy blinked. “I’ve read Snow White—the huntsman is there to cut out her heart.”
“Ah!” he said. “But he doesn’t, does he? You just need to go off into the woods with the right man.”
“And you are the right man?” she asked, unable to stop herself from smiling.
“I hope so,” he said, with an earnestness that at one time she would have felt was out of character, but now understood to be genuine. “Or at least, I hope I’m not the wrong one.”
