Page 21 of An Affair at Stonecliffe

“What?” That answer brought him up short. “No boy? It couldn’t have been the same woman.”

“A prime article in bad clothes?”

“She is attractive, yes, but...”

“I saw her.” The coach’s guard spoke up. “I didn’t see her hair ’neath her bonnet, but she had a face like an angel. And she had a little one with her. I saw him when she got on.”

“Well, she didn’t have one when she got off,” the driver retorted.

The other man tilted his head, considering. “Mayhap you’re right. I saw her walking away, but I don’t think the lad was with her.”

Good God, what had she done with Gilbert? Carlisle blindly shoved a few coins at the guard and strode back to his carriage. The one thing Carlisle had been certain of was that Noelle loved Gilbert. Had that all been an act, as well? No. His mind recoiled from the thought. But, blast it, if she had not abandoned the boy, where the hell was he?

Carlisle had thought that he could not be any more furious at Noelle, but he found now that his anger could reach new heights. Frustration and anger boiled in him as he directed Morton to drive back to Maidstone. How many stagecoaches passed in and out of that town? She could have gone in any direction.

Still, he must start somewhere. Logically, she would have taken the first coach to come through the town. Her aim was apparently not to go any certain place, but simply to cover her trail. There was more than one inn in Maidstone, but fortunately at the second one he tried, the ostlers remembered Noelle. It was lucky for him, he reflected, that no bonnet or drab clothes could make Noelle a woman whom men did not notice. A few coins in the hands of the grooms bought him the information that, two hours ago, she had taken a coach to Brighton by way of Tunbridge Wells.

He doubted that either place was Noelle’s ultimate destination. She would have chosen that coach because from it, she could again go anywhere. Was her plan to double back to pick up Gilbert from wherever she had stashed him? Had she simply left him alone at some stage stop along the way?

Carlisle ground his teeth in fury. She wasn’t fit to raise Gilbert—dragging him all over, keeping him from his family and his rightful place in the world, denying him the comforts and joys he should have. When he found Noelle, he’d have the boy’s whereabouts from her, no matter what it took. And after that, he’d make sure Gilbert was never again out of his sight. Noelle had accused him of attempting to take her son away from her. Well, this time he bloody well was.

At first, he decided not to inquire at the stop that the coach would have made between Maidstone and Tunbridge Wells. That would eat up precious time, and he had much ground to catch up. There seemed little chance she would have gotten off at such a small place, where there would be no other stage passing through for at least a day. But he decided he could not ignore the station. Noelle was wily enough to count on such an assumption on his part and leave the coach early, then turn in yet another direction or take some other mode of transportation. There could be someone helping her; someone could have waited for her at that stage stop. Perhaps she was involved with a man. There had been no sign of that, but she was capable enough to have kept his presence secret.

His mood was dark as his carriage rolled into the inn and stopped. He descended from the vehicle. At that moment a woman stepped out of the inn’s door, silhouetted against the light inside. Carlisle stopped short. He could not see the woman’s face, but he knew her immediately. Noelle.

She whirled and darted back inside. Carlisle started after her.

CARLISLE THORNE! Could nothing stop this man?

Noelle had expected he would discover what coach she had taken out of London. He was too clever, too determined, not to do that. But she’d presumed he would send his men after her, not pursue her himself, and she’d hoped whoever pursued her would ride straight to Dover, where he would conduct a fruitless search for her throughout the city, while she left the coach early and caught a stagecoach going somewhere else—it didn’t matter where, as long as it was away from Thorne and his men.

When they had stopped to rest in Maidstone, she’d slipped away to another, smaller inn, where she had the good luck to find a coach traveling to Brighton. She could disembark in Tunbridge Wells and make her way back to London to get Gil.

But then her luck had changed. The coach broke a wheel and had to be pulled to the nearest way station to be repaired. Noelle had been waiting ever since. Then, like a nightmare, Carlisle Thorne had stepped out of his carriage.

He was the most persistent, infuriating man Noelle had ever met. Since Gil was not with her, she didn’t feel the sort of fear she had in the past. But there was no way she was going to just stand around and let him find her. Noelle darted past a startled maid, and went barreling into the next room, which turned out to be the kitchen. She ran through it and out the back door into the dark night. Behind her she could hear a shriek and a crash, and she knew that Thorne must be on her heels. She didn’t dare glance back. Even with the moonlight, it was difficult to see the narrow path ahead.

A low stone wall appeared, and, lifting her skirts, she jumped over it, running on. She was, she realized, in a graveyard, and she had to slow down to avoid monuments and tombstones. Carlisle yelled her name, and a moment later she heard a thud, followed by a curse. With bitter satisfaction, she hoped he had run into one of the gravestones. Maybe he’d twisted an ankle.

Of course, he had not. She heard his running footsteps on the dirt path, drawing nearer and nearer. She ran through the lych-gate ahead and into the grassy churchyard itself. The church loomed up ahead and she had a desperate thought of running into it and calling for sanctuary. It wouldn’t matter, though—there was no sanctuary from someone like Carlisle Thorne.

Her lungs were heaving, her breath coming in hard pants. She felt as if her heart was about to burst in her chest. He was so close she could hear his rasping breath. Her toe caught an exposed tree root, and she went down. Thorne grabbed her before she could hit the ground, pulling her back against him, but she kicked out at him, and, overbalanced, they both tumbled to the ground.

Thorne twisted as they fell, which cushioned her own fall. His arms were like an iron cage around her, but she fought, squirming and kicking and hitting him with her fists, struggling to get away. They rolled across the ground in an almost silent struggle, broken only by their panting breaths.

He straddled her, pinning her to the ground with the full weight of his body. Noelle pushed up in a vain attempt to dislodge him. She was suddenly very aware of their position. His body was pressed into hers. She was surrounded by his heat, the scent of him in her nostrils, mingling with the smell of earth and crushed grass, his breath rasping in her ear.

Thorne, too, must have realized how suggestive their position was, for he scrambled off and jumped to his feet. Reaching down, he dragged her up. “What have you done with Gilbert? Where is he?”

She lifted her chin and glared up into his face without speaking. He might have captured her, but she wasn’t about to weakly acquiesce. She was, in any case, too breathless to say anything.

When she gave no reply, he let out a growl of frustration “Tell me, damn it, tell me what you did with Gilbert.”

“And if I don’t? What do you intend to do—beat it out of me?”

“It’s bloody tempting,” he retorted. “But I have never hit a woman and don’t plan to start now. What I will do is haul you into court. I am the boy’s guardian, and I think any judge would agree that it is I who have Gilbert’s best interests at heart, not a woman who refuses to let him live a decent life. A woman who breaks her word at every turn.” He dropped her arm, almost flinging it away. His eyes blazed; even in the darkness, she could see the fury in his face. “You promised me, damn it. You swore you would not run.”

“And you promised not to attack us!”