Chapter 26 #2
“Where…?” she whispered to herself as her fuzzy vision gradually focused.
She saw the cream-colored canopy overhead and, feeling smooth satin beneath her fingertips and soft pillows behind her aching head, she suddenly had the strangest sensation that she had experienced all this before.
Girlish words spoken long ago surfaced and echoed in her befuddled mind…
Yer angels, ain’t ye? I’ve died and gone straight t’ ‘eaven!
Yet there were differences, Susanna began to note, her hauntingly vivid memories colliding with reality. Only a single candle sputtered in this much larger room, and there was no cheery fire in the distant hearth. The windows were open, a cool breeze billowing the white curtains.
She carefully turned her aching head to the right, afraid to move too quickly lest she suffer more pain.
The walls were papered, but not with that pretty rose pattern.
She frowned. No, this couldn’t be the same room.
And she didn’t hear any female voices, neither Lady Redmayne’s proper tones nor the lilting brogue of Mary the waiting-maid.
Susanna cautiously shifted her head to the left.
There weren’t any voices at all and no wonder.
No one else seemed to be in the room but Adam, who was sound asleep on the divan pulled next to the bed
“Adam,” she breathed, tensing. Instantly old memories faded, and she knew exactly where she was, just as she was assaulted by a shocking realization of why her body hurt all over.
They had been having a dreadful argument…
he had accused her of the most horrible things.
She had shouted at him, saying she was a fool to have fallen in love with him, saying she was leaving at once for England.
She ran past him, but he dragged her back and then…
then he violently shoved her into the balcony railing!
She distinctly remembered saying to him right before he pushed her that he could tell his friends she had suddenly died…
and he must have taken her suggestion to heart! Dear God, he had tried to kill her!
Stricken with fear, Susanna’s sudden consuming thought was to get out of that room and far away from Adam as quickly as possible.
She gave no heed to the fact that she wore only a thin nightrail or that she possessed no money.
She had her costly wedding ring, which she was certain would buy her some clothes and passage back to England. That was all she needed.
Holding her breath, she eased back the covers and slid from the bed, wincing at the terrible pain in her head and the aching soreness in her limbs.
Fleetingly grateful that she had suffered no broken bones in that terrifying fall, she focused intently upon the door and, swaying slightly from her skewed sense of balance, she passed as silently as a wraith across the carpet.
Once, Adam shifted on the divan and she froze, certain that he would wake and spy her trying to escape.
Her half-dazed mind raced wildly—what would he do to her?
She had obviously frustrated his scheme by surviving her plunge from the balcony.
Would he try to smother her with a pillow, or was it enough that she now knew he was capable of murdering her and he could use it as a threat to force her to his will?
Susanna didn’t resume her desperate flight until he sighed heavily in his sleep, his shadowed face turned away from her.
Shivering in the cool night air wafting in from the windows, she slowly turned the latch and drew open the door just enough to squeeze through.
Then she closed it with a soft click, overwhelming relief flooding her bruised body as she fled down the hallway to the stairs.
She paused on the landing, remembering that there was always a footman at the front door. Taking the first few steps with great caution, her bare feet making no sound, she heard the man snoring deeply and sensed she would not wake him if she went out the back way.
Her head pounding anew from her exertions, she raced down the rest of the stairs and along the darkened hall to the French doors.
She was surprised to find one side boarded up, a large pane of glass missing.
The bolt was also drawn, and fumbling at it, she managed to open the other door and escape into the black night.
With only the faintest sliver of moon to guide her, Susanna knew it must be very late, for a heavy stillness hung over the main grounds. Even the distant servants’ quarters were silent, everyone having gone to bed.
As she hurried around the house and made her way through the enveloping darkness to the stable, she wished she had taken a moment to whisk a dressing gown around her bare shoulders.
Her flimsy silken garment was no match for the coolness of this early September evening, although the fresh, sweet-smelling air was helping to restore her wits and sense of balance.
Then, hearing the sudden snap of a branch close behind her, she forgot her teeth-chattering discomfort and ran all the faster, knowing that wild creatures roamed the grounds freely at night.
She exhaled with relief when she reached the stable and pulled back one of the doors, assailed by the pungent aromas of horses, straw, and oiled leather.
Expecting to find herself alone, she was startled to see Zachary Roe, the building’s manager, step from a stall where pregnant mares nearing their time to foal were usually kept.
He raised his lantern high, and seemed equally startled to see her.
“Mistress Camille, what are you doing out here?” he queried, studying her flushed face with concern. “I heard what happened to you this afternoon. You should be abed.”
“I—I need a horse, Zachary. Would you kindly saddle my mare?”
“Pardon me for asking, ma’am, but for what? It’s so dark tonight, nobody in his right mind would want to be out riding. Let me walk you back to the house—”
“No!” she said, hurrying past him to the stall where her snow-white mare was contentedly munching oats. “If you won’t do as I ask, I’ll saddle her myself.”
“But Mistress Camille—”
“That’s all right, Zachary. I’ll assist my wife.”
Gasping, Susanna spun to find Adam standing just inside the stable door, his powerful, broad-shouldered form casting a huge shadow against the planked wall and upwards toward the ceiling.
“You! Don’t you dare come near me!” she demanded, panicked, her eyes darting for anything she might use as a weapon against him. She spied a pitchfork that had been left propped against a nearby stall, and grabbing the tool with aching arms, lowered it threateningly.
“Zachary, would you leave us?” Adam suggested calmly, although he felt anything but calm.
He had never experienced such a scare as when he had abruptly awoken at the sound of the door clicking shut to find Susanna gone from their bed.
Realizing she had fled, he had followed the sweet scent of her jasmine perfume downstairs, then had spied her white nightrail through the trees the moment he stepped outside the back door.
He would have caught up with her sooner if not for his blasted ankle.
The spry stable manager glanced from Susanna back to Adam, his relieved expression showing he was only too eager to oblige.
“Yes, sir, Master Thornton, I think I will.” Setting the lantern on a bench, he muttered on his way out, “Lucky thing that mare won’t be foaling until tomorrow. Good evening to you.”
Too intent upon Susanna to make a reply, Adam saw the stark fear in her wide, beautiful eyes, and he knew with intense regret that he had put it there.
He couldn’t blame her if she now thought the worse of him.
He certainly hadn’t given her any benefit of the doubt since their marriage.
He began to move cautiously toward her, not so much because of the pitchfork she wielded, but because he didn’t want to upset her further.
She had already endured so much at his doing.
“Susanna, I’m not going to try and touch you. I just want to talk,” he said soothingly, noting that she was swaying a little, obviously still suffering the aftereffects of her fall.
“We have nothing to discuss!” she countered, backing away a few steps. “I told you before you shoved me from the balcony that I was leaving for England, and I mean to do it! You can’t make me stay here!”