Chapter 4
Chapter
Four
The mist was thicker that morning, a pale, shifting veil that shimmered just above the ground and curled around the trunks of the trees like smoke.
If he’d been inclined to more poetic assessments of his surroundings, he might have thought that it softened the world, turning familiar paths into strange, ghostly corridors, as it muffled the steady rhythm of his horse’s hooves as they rode deeper into the woods.
But he was not given to such poetic notions.
Instead, he focused on the path, on not letting his mount stumble.
Good horses were easy enough to come by, but Scratch was not a good horse.
He was an excellent horse and one who had seen him through countless campaigns and battles.
He wasn’t so much a horse as a trusted companion.
And that was only further proof of his current state of madness, for lack of a better term.
Madness that had been sparked by a single meeting with an impertinent, impudent young woman with warm brown eyes and hair that he longed to see freed from its confines.
It had been two days since their encounter — two days since Miss Eliza Ashcombe had walked, entirely uninvited, into his ordered existence and refused to leave again.
Not from his thoughts, at any rate. He had reviewed the agreement in the interim, poring over every line and clause with the meticulous care of a man accustomed to solving problems by dissecting them into manageable pieces.
It had answered some of his questions — yes, the lease was legitimate; yes, it was binding; yes, his ancestors had bound their bloodline to hers with a legal knot that could not easily be untangled.
And yet, for every answer, three more questions had arisen. What had compelled the third Earl to grant such a privilege to a family like the Ashcombes? What had forged this peculiar alliance between their lines?
He told himself that was why he was here again.
Curiosity. A desire to solve a puzzle. The need to understand the shape and scope of the situation in which he found himself.
It had nothing at all to do with the fact that, in two days’ time, he had thought of Miss Ashcombe’s very fine eyes — too calm, too steady — more often than was remotely reasonable.
It had nothing to do with the fact that he could recall the exact shape of her nose, the slight wing of her brow, the perfect curve of her lips before they’d pressed into a line of disapproval.
It was nothing more than curiosity.
And yet…
His gaze swept the trees around him, searching the pale light for a glimpse of her.
And then he saw her.
She was walking not far ahead, the hem of her cloak whispering over the damp earth as the fog swirled about her.
A basket was swinging gently from one gloved hand.
She moved a few feet ahead and the mist parted around her like a curtain, blurring the edges of her form so that, for a moment, she did not look entirely real — more phantom than flesh and blood, as though the forest itself had conjured her from memory and longing.
“Eliza!” He called out.
The name was out before he realized he had spoken it, too familiar and too bold, but it was too late to call it back. She did not respond. Did not turn. Did not so much as falter in her step.
“Eliza!” he called again, louder this time. “Miss Ashcombe!”
Still nothing.
A flicker of irritation stirred in his chest. Was she truly so childish as to ignore him completely?
Did she mean to play some petty game of evasion simply to vex him?
The very thought has his jaw clenching, his back teeth grinding together.
Gathering the reins, he urged his horse forward, determined to catch up with her and demand an explanation.
He should have caught her quickly. He could see her on the path ahead, though she was much further away than she ought to have been given that she was walking so sedately.
Ducking his head to avoid a low hanging branch, when he straightened again the path before him was empty. Even the fog had stilled. And Eliza Ashcombe was simply gone.
Just… gone. One moment she was there, the mist swirling around the deep claret of her cloak — and the next, there was nothing. Only the dense white fog and the quiet drip of dew from the branches above.
Gabriel reined in sharply, staring at the empty space where she had been.
His heartbeat thundered in his ears, too fast for the simple exertion of riding.
“Impossible,” he muttered under his breath.
He had seen her. He knew he had seen her.
And yet she had vanished as though she’d never been there at all.
Was he losing his mind? Had his imagination — stoked by too many hours spent thinking about a woman he barely knew — conjured an image of her from the mist? The notion was absurd. And yet so was the alternative. Women did not simply vanish into thin air.
He turned his horse around, retracing his path back toward the main road, intending to return to the Hall and forget the whole foolish business.
But as he rounded a bend in the trail, his horse snorted and slowed, and there she was again — standing calmly a short distance ahead, basket in hand, as though she had been walking there all along.
This time she was not spectral. She was solid and real and infuriatingly composed.
“What the devil is this?” Gabriel demanded, swinging down from the saddle in one fluid motion. “What sort of infantile games are you playing at?”
Her brows rose, her expression the very picture of cool indifference. “I do not play games, Lord Blackburn.”
“You vanished,” he said flatly. “One moment you were there — directly ahead of me — and the next, you were gone. And now here you are again, in the opposite direction no less.”
She tilted her head, regarding him as one might a particularly slow-witted child. “If I vanished, my lord, then I fear that is your problem, not mine. I have been here all along. I only left my cottage a few moments ago.”
“Do not toy with me,” he bit out, more sharply than he intended. “I saw you.”
“Then perhaps you should question your eyesight,” she replied, her voice maddeningly serene. “Because I assure you, I have done nothing of the sort. I have neither the time nor the inclination to play games — and even if I did, I would hardly play them with someone I hold in such profound dislike.”
Her words landed like a slap — not because of their content, which was no more than he had expected, but because of the utter calm with which she delivered them. There was no malice in her tone, no venom. Merely a statement of fact, cool and dispassionate.
“Dislike?” he repeated, something inexplicably tight settling in his chest.
“Indeed,” she said lightly. “You are far too arrogant and far too pleased with yourself for my tastes. And now, if you’ll excuse me, I have work to do.”
She brushed past him, the faint and familiar scent of rosemary lingering in her wake, leaving him standing in the middle of the misty path — unsettled, frustrated, and more intrigued than he cared to admit.