Chapter Fifteen
Present Day
This ride was interminable. It hadn’t been that long, he knew it, yet it felt as though forever and a half had already passed.
The scenery they passed, the rolling hills, the fields of heather, they were all blurring together.
The clouds above coated the sky in gray, but finally the rains had stopped.
The roads were muddy, but not too thick.
The road was a safe one. Usually. He knew exactly where they were going, yet it felt as if they were headed somewhere new.
This path that should lead him home was leading him somewhere beyond home.
If he made it out alive and saw Nobi again, perhaps home would be redefined.
And maybe that’s why this journey tempted him to feel hopeful even though it was foreboding.
Maybe one day he would travel this road with Nobi and they would comment on the delight of the purple coated fields.
They would optimistically predict the turn of the weather.
They would enjoy this trip. Maybe. One day.
But what if he didn’t make it out of this alive?
He smashed the thought in his mind. He couldn’t think that way.
He had so much life left to live. So much left to do and be.
So many people he wanted to see. His friends.
His family. Hell, he would take a kind neighbor right about now if that’s the only option he was given.
He had to tell Sam the truth about his father. He had to tell Nobi…more. Something.
And what of his dreams to travel the world?
He had so much he wanted to still see, didn’t he?
He wanted to travel. The pyramids. The cathedrals.
The food he wanted to try. The people and cultures he wanted to be introduced to.
After all this time he had spent delaying his dreams (all for good reasons and without regret), how could he live with himself if he died before he got the chance to see it all?
Well, that was circular thinking if there ever was any.
He couldn’t live with himself if he died before he had a chance to fully come alive.
And he wanted to fully be alive, the same way he had felt with…when…
Could he bring himself to admit it now? After all these years…
Despite himself, only one thing, specifically, one person was first and foremost in his mind.
Zenobia.
Yes, they were friends. But he had always wanted to be more than friends. He was just considerate of the line that she drew in the sand, the boundaries, the expectations, the respect she demanded. And deserved.
And he wanted to tell her. Even thinking about that confession caused more sweat to pour down his back than all the occurrences of the day so far…and really, that had been quite a lot.
If he told her how he really felt, he might be breaking the friendship promise, and a thousand needles was not an appealing consequence. Not that any consequences were ever appealing.
But still, if he told her, she might resent him forever.
The options swimming in front of him were blurring. He could die. He could die and never have told her. He could live and still never tell her. They would stay friends. He could live and tell her…and maybe…he could convince her to fall in love with him too.
It would be the biggest risk of his entire life.
The risk that would make or break him and his entire future. The question was whether or not he could live without her friendship. Hauntingly, the answer to that was a no, the likes of which reverberated across oceans.
So obviously that wasn’t the question he wanted to answer right now. He wanted to ask and answer a new question. Could he live with himself if he didn’t tell her how he felt?
Silence had never roared so loudly in his brain at the thought.
She was a beauty inside and out. Self-assured and selfless.
A treasure that he had discovered by accident yet protected with the greatest of intentions.
That first night in the garden, he knew she was his to protect.
To care for. To love…But it had all happened so quickly, and of course a man didn’t just blurt out, I love you, to a woman he had known for less than an evening.
So when they had found each other again (and again and again), he let her take the lead.
He followed her, yes he could admit it, like a lost puppy.
But he took what he could, gave what he could, and he loved it as much as he could.
It felt to him that she was already his, even though the stakes had not been claimed that way. They knew each other better than anyone else, he was sure of it. And now life was showing him what it could be if he never took the chance to make that claim official.
He couldn’t. He simply could not justify it to himself if he didn’t take his shot.
He needed to come out of this alive. That’s all there was to it.
A plan was forming in Chris’s mind as the carriage neared his home.
He wished his captors were only after the money.
He could offer to pay them, then later have a Bow Street runner find them and charge them.
Alas, they wanted the pistols as much as they were after the money.
He didn’t want to let Sam down, so it was his last resort to give them ruffians the dueling pistols.
He didn’t think the two ruffians were violent, but he wasn’t sure.
So he didn’t really want to risk any lives if he didn’t have to.
Which meant avoiding the front door at all costs.
His staff was loyal to him. Most of them had been there generationally.
If he could protect them, he would, though his hands were tied.
Literally.
Thank God that while the two had napped, he had been able to free his legs.
For now, and for appearances sake, he left the rope loose around his legs, but in a trice, he would be able to grab the rope and toss it aside.
Knowing freedom was so close yet still so far away produced a nervous energy to trail up and down his legs.
He had to work hard at not letting his knee bounce up and down reflecting those nerves.
As for the rest of his plan…that would take some finagling.
If he could convince Lester, Jax, and their driver to go around the back way and stay out of sight of the servants, then he would be alone with them.
It would be three against one, but he had an idea that just might work.
His plan required a diversion, a tangle, and then making a run for it.
If he could break free from the three, and maybe have only one to contend with, he might stand a chance.
At that point, if he was running close enough to the stables, he could call for help.
The servants there were at least tougher.
Thicker skinned and stronger muscles. They would be able to help him.
If they went through the front door, there was a chance the butler (well, maybe not the butler, but definitely one of the servants) would swoon.
Chris wanted adventure, but up until now he was the man who played it safe.
He never took unnecessary risks, especially if other lives were at stake.
That was James, though he might beg to differ.
Chris wasn’t even the type to get caught up in the competitions between the four of them.
No, those roles were reserved for Wes and Sam.
Those two would duke it out (in more ways than one) until the cows came home.
If only they were here with him now…the best he could do was channel their wisdom and strength.
Jax was nodding off in the carriage, no longer stoically staring out the window.
He was a big man, so Chris hoped that between the two of them, Jax wouldn’t be the one to give him chase.
The other one, Lester, was tapping his fingers, one by one, along the squabs.
He looked to be counting something. Couldn’t be the passing trees, could it?
The best way to convince his captors of his plans was to make them think the plan was their idea. So Chris started planting the seed. Since Lester had removed the gag a while back, he was able to speak.
“We’re almost there.” He tried to keep his voice casual.
“You would know,” Lester replied curtly, still tapping his fingers. And yet, it appeared to be in sync with the passing trees.
“Yes. Though I don’t know what’s going to happen when we get there.”
“Besides you giving us the pistols?” Lester cackled.
“Right. That. And then you’ll just be on your way.”
“Or something like that.”
And that was the part, the or something like that part that niggled at Chris. He couldn’t predict the future. What if he gave up the pistols and then they left him for dead anyway? No, he couldn’t take that chance. There was only one chance he knew he had to take.
Resolved, Chris pushed Lester a bit more. “You’re probably not going to tell me your plan, are you?”
“Nope,” Lester said with a smug grin, the tapping ceased.
“But I guess you’ll be trying to sneak me in so no one sees us.”
Lester’s eyes darted to his sleeping counterpart. “I can’t be saying any of that.”
“That’s the only smart thing to do. I’m sure you already know about the back road that leads to the stables instead of the front door. It’s the next right. Why am I telling you that? You already know that. You would have done your investigating beforehand.”
“Of course,” he scoffed haughtily. “There’s no better access point.”
“No. I agree. It’s the quietest one. Unfortunately for me, no one will see us enter the grounds.”
Lester leaned back into the squabs with a smile on his face. “And that’s only part of the plan.”
Within a minute, Lester had to “take a piss” so he stopped the carriage. Clearly he was giving new directions to the driver, but Chris feigned ignorance.
It didn’t take long for the carriage to rumble along the back road, jarring Jax awake. “Where are we?” He grumbled.
Lester nudged him. “We’re going the back way. Just like we said we would take if we found out that the pistols were at his house, remember?”
“I don’t rem—”
In a role reversal, Lester slugged him in the shoulder. “Jax, you might have forgotten.” He winked (sort of, it was more of an awkward blink) at his friend. “But this is what we planned. So no one sees us coming up to the front door.”
With a low mumble, Jax grumbled a few more choice words and then rubbed his eyes to look out the window, more clearly resuming his position from earlier in the day.
“Let’s just get there and get this over with,” he added.
Chris was counting down the minutes, waiting for the expected dip in the road that would throw any unfamiliar travelers for a loop.
He was counting on that hole still being there, especially with the recent rains, that hole should be nice and primed to give any carriage a good bounce.
It was hard to see since it was just past the crest of a small hill, and it was highly unlikely anyone had filled it.
The only people who traveled this road knew it so well that they just avoided it.
The road was certainly wide enough to do so.
Never had Chris been so thankful for letting something deteriorate before.
It was coming soon, he just needed to wait.
It was tedious to wait, and it was overly optimistic, but it was his best chance.
No sooner had he finished that thought than his best chance was upon him.
The first quick lurch of the carriage told him that the drivers had seen the hole far too late.
The second lurch, followed promptly by a sway, confirmed to him that the carriage was going down.
The final jolt promised him the diversion he was hoping for.
The driver would be stuck seeing to the horses, and hopefully one of the other two would be distracted for just long enough…
Chris grabbed the loose rope around his feet and tossed it at the two men. Even if for a split second they had to untangle themselves, that would buy him some time.
Then he banged against the door, flinging it open, and he took off running. He had the distinct advantage this time, as he knew the lay of the land. If only he could get to the stables, or even within shouting distance.
Despite knowing he was still too far away, he bellowed, calling out to the stablehand. He had to take a shot. There was a chance someone was out taking a later afternoon stroll. There was a chance that someone was riding a horse in the woods. There was a chance…
But that chance was just not in his favor today.
Because as he pushed forward in his agonizingly awkward race toward his house, he just realized that there was actually a much closer to no chance that anyone would hear him.
He had forgotten that he had given them all the day off to attend the annual fair.
If one or two remained at home, he might be lucky.
But what were the chances of that happening?
And that one of them would hear him. With his luck thinning, he still raced forward.
There had to be a way out. And he wouldn’t stop running until he found it.
The crazy thing about running and trying not to get caught though, was how many thoughts, how many memories, and how vividly they could all fly through his brain at once. In a single instance, a very significant portion of Chris’s life flashed before his eyes.