Chapter 4
“That’s impossible,” Miss Turner said immediately—and completely illogically. It was, of course, possible for people to leave the estate, no matter the woman’s snide comments about chaperonage and his hiding things.
Aaron closed his eyes briefly before giving his maid a brief nod of dismissal.
The girl wasn’t paid well enough to deal with the elder Miss Turner’s argumentativeness.
Hell, Aaron wasn’t certain that the entire worth of the dukedom was enough recompense for working with Miss Turner’s argumentativeness.
“That’s impossible,” the woman repeated, turning to face him, her brow creased. It was real worry on her face now, not the irritation that had been there before.
She had an extremely expressive face. He had noted it within moments of speaking with her.
He made a habit of noticing things—one didn’t survive combat the way he had without keeping stock of every detail of an environment—but there was something about Miss Phoebe Turner’s face that he kept noticing.
Probably the way she put her emotions into everything, he decided. It had been a long time since he’d seen someone who revealed their every thought so openly. It had been just he and the staff here for so long, and they all wore the professional masks of well-trained servants.
Griggs, he thought suddenly, the man’s face flashing through his memory. That was the last person Aaron had known who was like this—smiling, then frowning, then scrunching up his nose. He was dead now, run through by a French bayonet.
Aaron pushed the thought away and refocused on Miss Turner, who was still speaking though she’d gone alarmingly pale in the last moments.
“She just went out for some air,” Miss Turner continued, sounding as though she was trying to convince herself more than anything else. It was the voice that men used before battle when they talked about the certainty that they would survive. Most wouldn’t.
“She just needed some air,” the woman repeated. “I’ll just go find her.”
Aaron just managed to snag her hand before she darted blindly down the hallway. She was a troublemaker. Reckless and unpredictable.
Reckless unpredictability was the thing that got good men killed. Or women… though Aaron was not at all certain that this one fit most conventional definitions of good. She was extremely interesting, however.
Interesting probably also got people killed.
“I’ll send the footmen,” he said in response to the way Miss Turner looked pointedly at his hand on hers. “The weather is bad out there and getting worse. You can’t go out.”
She snatched her hand out of his. He fought the urge to flex his fingers—or worse, reach for her again.
“The hell I can’t,” she snapped. “Your staff doesn’t know my sister. I do. I will find her.”
She had been trying to duck past him throughout their conversation, but this time, she just pushed past. Aaron might have been rough enough around the edges to grab her hand to try to stop her, but he was still a gentleman. He wasn’t going to physically restrain a lady.
He wasn’t going to let her storm off into the night, either, though.
He followed her.
“Miss Turner,” he said sternly. It was a voice that had stopped hardened soldiers in their tracks. Miss Turner didn’t even look at him. “You cannot do this.”
She ignored him. She looked into the breakfast room, saw there was no door leading to the outside, and kept going. The next room was a parlor with a glass door leading out into the veranda. The glass meant that the room was frigid in the winter; nobody had used it for months.
Miss Turner ignored the cloth-covered furniture and yanked the door open. She was immediately blasted by a gust of wind, which made her stagger back a step, but the stubborn little thing just hunched against the blow and continued forward.
“Miss Turner!” he called again. This voice was the one that had made subordinates practically faint.
The little harridan just took one labored step further into the maelstrom.
For Christ’s sake! It was bad enough that there was some scandal brewing right beneath Aaron’s nose.
That was something he didn’t like, but he could handle it, just as long as he got all the information.
Scandals in the ton rarely came with French cannons pointed at him, so he had to assume that he had managed worse in his time.
Even the runaway bride was something that could be managed.
He had paid less attention to the younger Miss Turner than likely he ought to have done, but she’d seemed very wan and waifish.
No doubt she was just having some sort of missish attack of nerves.
She probably wasn’t even outside. She was probably just hiding out somewhere. That, too, would be fine.
What Aaron could not stand, however, was a woman freezing to death on his grounds—and that was what Miss Phoebe Turner was likely to do if she kept plunging out into the cold without even a proper cloak to keep her warm. This was killing weather; Aaron had seen it in his time on campaign.
He couldn’t stand any more death. He’d had far more than his fair share.
The termagant kept walking, alas, leaving Aaron no choice but to follow her. Even his sturdier frame was buffeted enough by the wind that walking wasn’t easy.
The snow had built up, too, drifting against the house in a way that left the depth inconsistent.
There were at least a few inches on the grounds now, though.
It was likely the most significant snowfall they’d had in years—something that meant that Miss Turner was unlikely to be experienced in surviving in extreme weather.
“Miss Turner!” he called for the third—and God help him, it had better be the last time.
Again, she didn’t respond, but this time it might have been because she couldn’t hear him over the howl of the wind.
Aaron had to admit, despite himself, that she was making fairly impressive progress.
She was significantly smaller than Aaron’s muscular bulk, but she wasn’t as petite as many of the young ladies in Aaron’s experience.
She was athletic, as if she got a great deal of exercise.
He had always admired a vigorous constitution in a woman.
Not, of course, he thought as he trudged after her, that he had been admiring Miss Phoebe Turner. He just noticed. It was good after all. She was unlikely to perish from the driving snow that bit at his cheeks and hands.
He couldn’t hear her, either, he realized as he saw her cup her hands to her mouth, most likely to call out for her sister.
The sight reminded him of the futility of this idiotic journey.
He redoubled his efforts and walked toward her.
It was only when he was within an arm’s length of her that he could hear her cries.
“Hannah? Hannah, darling, where are you?”
“She can’t hear you!” he shouted close to her ear, making her jump in surprise. Christ, she had the awareness of a rock. First, crashing into him, now not even noticing him when he’d been shouting for her. It was a wonder the woman had made it this far in life.
Though perhaps she’s done it on belligerence alone, he thought as she turned on him with a ferocious scowl.
“How do you know?” she shouted back.
He gestured at the small space between them, then toward his ear, feeling faintly ridiculous at the pantomime. The better question would have been why she was asking stupid questions, but the answer to that was absolute belligerence, so he didn’t waste the breath.
“We have to go back,” he insisted, grabbing her arm and tugging—not enough to harm her but enough to make his point.
She shook him off.
“Not until I find my sister!” This time, he thought he detected more than stubbornness in the shout. She was worried too.
Hell, she was likely correct to worry. He had been working on the assumption that the younger Miss Turner was not foolish enough to come outside in this weather, but if her sister had plunged frantically after her, maybe he was wrong.
The threat of death seemed much more distant to people who didn’t look it in the face so often, after all.
But nothing about Miss Hannah’s situation would be improved by Miss Turner losing half her toes. If her shoes were anything like her gown in terms of practicality, they had to be soaked through already.
He looked at the stubborn set of her mouth and made, as he had so many times before, a decision designed to save a life.
He picked her up by her waist, hauled her over his shoulder, and began walking back toward the house.
Immediately, she began to fight him, squirming and kicking, her little fists pounding uselessly at his back.
He merely wrapped an arm behind her knees, tried to ignore that the bottom so near his face was far rounder and more pleasant than any of the men’s that he had carried this same way, and strode back toward the warmth of the house as quickly as he could.
He had to fight the verandah door to get it open again as the wind was working against him, but fortunately, a footman was inside the parlor and leapt to help him.
“—dare you? Unhand me at once!”
Once they were out of the wind, Aaron could hear Miss Turner’s complaints, which he assumed had been unceasing during the trek. He ignored them and lifted her back over his shoulder, placing her gently on a settee before turning to the servant.
“Gather several of the men at once,” he commanded in his admiral’s voice, ignoring Miss Turner’s squawking.
“Dress warmly and search the grounds for Miss Hannah. Instruct the cook to give you all warm toddies to take with you and trade off as often as you can manage. I’m not going to have anyone die out there tonight. ”
The footman nodded sharply, as well-trained as any of Aaron’s naval men.
“At once, Your Grace,” he said before turning on his heel and striding out.
That handled, Aaron turned to look down at the unkempt young woman who was still shouting at him.