Chapter Two
Sophie raised her face from Noah’s chest and drew a deep breath as she checked for injuries. It would do no good to stand only to collapse on him again.
Other than bruises and an aching head, she was fine. Noah wasn’t bleeding, not that she could see, anyway, and he was still breathing. That was good.
Shadows flickered along the wall, backlit by flames. Maybe it wasn’t good. Maybe they had ended up in hell. No, that was daft. Her, maybe. But Noah? He’d never end up in hell. Smoke burned her nose.
“It’s a fire, y’numpty,” she muttered.
Noah groaned as she pushed against his chest to stand upright—only to bash the back of her head against the wall that had become the ceiling.
“Blast.” Sophie bent double, holding one hand to her hair and using the other to grasp the first thick article she spied. A coat. “Noah? Noah!”
“Wha’? Ow. Sophie?”
“Can you move?” The candle had caught Noah’s papers, which had led to her useless straw hat. The next items in the path were her case and his writing slope. She threw the coat over the flames.
Noah reached to snatch it back. “Wait.”
Sophie stepped onto the wool, stomping her boots to ensure the flames were extinguished. “I would rather lose a coat than burn to death.”
“Now we’re in the dark and short a coat,” he grumbled.
“Forgive me for saving your life. Not to mention your work and maybe a roof over our heads.” Despite her words, Sophie rubbed her palms over her forearms as the darkness pressed against the wreckage surrounding them.
“And what a roof it is.” Noah sighed as he struggled to his feet. He cracked his head on the low ceiling. “Damnation. This trip will kill me yet.”
“Well, it was your idea to make the journey,” she groused. The fog crept toward them like a living thing, combining with the moonlight and the scent of ashes on the air. Panic tightened her lungs and sent her in search of her case. “Are you injured other than the knot on your head?”
“I don’t believe so,” Noah said after a moment. “Are you?”
“No.” The brass latches on her case were warm from the fire, and they gave easily. “I’m not sure how we managed it.”
The candles were still tucked in a pocket, and her tinderbox waited beneath them. Her fingers, however, were trembling too badly to be useful. Her eyes burned with unshed tears.
Drat and damn. Of all the things to cry over tonight, the dark should not be one of them.
Noah knelt and held out his hand. “Can I help?”
Sophie delivered them without a word and watched him deftly open the box. Its tarnished lid was dull in the moonlight, and the engraving was nothing but a shadow.
“Fetch some paper, would you?” he said as he positioned the flint and steel above the charcloth.
There was paper everywhere, but all she could do was stare at it. She wasn’t sure which was less precious to him.
“Any of it will do,” he said as he bent to blow over the sparks.
Sophie lifted the page nearest her, ripped a strip from its top, and twisted it tightly before offering it to Noah. Rather than taking it, he placed the glowing charcloth to it and waited until it flamed.
She dropped the remainder of the page back to the pile and scrambled for a candle. As she lit that one, he lifted the other. The weak glow held the dark at bay.
“I should get you some lucifers for your case.” His words rumbled through her. “They’d be quicker.”
“Flint and steel have never let me down.” Sulphur matches would never hold the memories that her grandfather’s tinderbox carried.
The light grew stronger, giving her a good look at him.
His dark hair resembled a feather duster that a maid had dropped to the floor, and soot darkened his nose and chin. A jagged gash bisected the purplish lump on his forehead. “You’re bleeding.”
Noah touched the wound and winced. But his fingers came away clean. “It’s dried already.” He reached to the back of his head and winced again. “And my brain seems to be intact.”
Sophie checked her knot too. “We must have struck the same railing.” It would be tender for a while, and her hats would be uncomfortable, but she wasn’t the worse for wear.
His fingers covered hers for a moment and then brushed them aside. His dark gaze held hers as he checked the injury, frowning when she winced. “You’re certain you’re well?”
She could do nothing but nod as his fingers tangled in her hair and brushed her scalp. Despite the lingering smoke, she could smell the mint on his breath and the citrus spice of his cologne.
Noah pulled his handkerchief from his pocket and wiped her face, starting under her eyes. Heat spread over her cheeks as she realized they were wet. It doubled when she recalled screaming against his shirt as they had tumbled from the road.
“I’m sorry for this mess, Sophie.”
“It’s the smoke,” she blustered as she plucked the cloth from his fingers. “All the varnish makes for an acrid smell.”
She would rather burn to death than tell him she was afraid of the dark. It came from years of waking alone in the rooms behind the hackney office, without candles because they were saved for carriages and the convenience of toffs who never gave them a second thought.
She returned the handkerchief to Noah. All sorts of things scurried through the darkness in London.
“Let’s see what’s what,” he said as he stood as much as the upended coach would allow. Candle in one hand, he offered her the other.
Sophie took it without thinking, but froze as skin met skin. She had watched Noah’s hands for two years, mesmerized by how well he handled a pen, given that his fingers were half again longer than hers. At night, she wondered how his touch would feel.
Warm. Strong. Sure. That was how it felt.
They dipped their heads and stepped into the wilds of the moor.
It was silent as a churchyard, thanks to the fog. And when the wind blew, the heather rustled like a lady’s opera gown. Night birds called in eerie whistles.
“There aren’t any houses,” Sophie whispered. After a life in London, where the streetlights fluttered until well into the night and people lived cheek to jowl, it was alarming to see nothing.
“Even if they’re out there, the fog would swallow the light.” Noah’s fingers threaded through hers. “But look at the sky.”
Once, leaving a party, a lady’s strand of diamonds had broken and the stones had tumbled over the cab’s floor, catching the light. Sophie, just a child then, had thought those stones were the prettiest things she’d ever seen.
They weren’t a patch on this sky.
“They look close enough to touch.” She tilted her head to keep from losing her balance and froze when Noah’s wool coat scratched her temple.
They spent a great deal of time together. He was always there to help her in and out of trains and coaches, or to open the doors. He was a proper gentleman, after all. Otherwise, they kept their distance. Business kept a barrier between them that was maddening at times.
But it was also safe. Because if she touched Noah too much, it would be difficult to remember that he wasn’t hers. He belonged to a world of finer things, a place where ladies drank tea from china rather than a chipped mug and planned parties rather than a trip to the farrier or the wheelwright.
Sophie stepped away and tugged to loosen her hold. After a moment, he released her with the strangest look on his face. “Sophie, I—”
“This will be useful.” She walked to the coach and lifted a lantern from the wreckage. A few of the panes were cracked, and one was gone altogether, but it would help save their hands from dripping candles.
And focusing on regular things would save her from wishful thinking.
“Here’s a hatchet.” Noah scooped it from the ground. “That will be useful for firewood.”
She traded one stubby candle for her longer one. The light grew stronger, allowing Noah to douse his candle to save for later.
Sophie turned to assess the damage to the coach, but the veins in the lantern’s cracked panes created a kaleidoscope of shadows that made it difficult.
Eventually the sad state of it became obvious.
The walls had gaping holes, as though a dragon had raked its claws across the wood, and the front wheels were askew.
The rear axle had been snapped like dry kindling.
Behind them, a steep hill, part ridge, part field, rose until she couldn’t see the road above.
“Help me!” The broken, hoarse cry floated across the moor.
“Dumfries?” Sophie shouted. She looked at Noah. “Do you think that could be him?”
“Yes, unless there were two accidents on the road this evening.” He began to walk, using the lantern to find solid footing. He reached for Sophie’s hand. “We’d best stick together.”
The road and the field met at the bottom of the hill. Once on level ground, they stopped to catch their breath. “I’m beginning to hate this place,” Sophie said between inhales, her hands on her knees.
“As am I,” Noah said. “London businesses from now on, I think.”
She nodded. “Deal.”
They followed Dumfries’s shouts until they found him in a heap not far from the coach and just off the road.
His clothes were torn, and one arm hung limp and useless from a drooping shoulder.
Sophie held the lantern higher, then caught her breath.
His face was battered to the point that he was almost unrecognizable.
Grandfather had always cautioned her about runaway teams and releasing the reins lest they drag her to death. Dumfries should have received the same lecture.
“Can you move?” she asked as she knelt beside him.
“No, miss. Not well.” Each breath struggled from him in a raspy wheeze.
Noah touched her shoulder and turned for the coach, lengthening his stride. After a few minutes, cracks and snaps split the silence as something tore the coach apart.
“Mr. Middleton’ll have my arse on a platter for this.” He looked up at her. “Beggin’ your pardon, miss.”
“You can’t be blamed for the condition of the roads,” she said. He could be blamed for haring around corners like they were being chased by the devil himself, but that was a discussion for another day.