AllFreeNovel
Share Us
Her hair had come loose, a wild cloud of silk and fire.
And he forgot everything, because he could not look away from it, finally free, billowing around her in a gravity-defying squall, long and lush and vibrant and so much more beautiful than he’d imagined.
This woman, whom he’d noticed from the moment they met, was now impossible to ignore.
Which was why he missed the dip in the road.
“Clayborn!” she shouted, looking to him, concern behind her wire-rimmed spectacles. “The road!”
It was too late. He hit the uneven patch—sunken from weather and wear—before he could do anything to stop it, even as he reacted, fast and capable, pulling hard on the reins, coming to his feet on the block, he knew it was too little and too late. The carriage tilted, the shift punctuated with a mighty crack. A stutter in the alreadywildly bouncing ride. And then the tilt went farther, more dangerous. He didn’t have a choice.
Confirming Adelaide’s carriage was not in the path of whatever was to happen to his own, he released the reins and jumped.
Following the momentum of the leap, he tucked and rolled and tried his damnedest not to break anything, but when he came to a stop in a ditch on the side of the fast-darkening road, the breath knocked from his lungs, he was fairly certain he was not in one piece.
Nevertheless, the groan of metal, punctuated by the crash of wood and glass and the wild sounds of two rightfully terrified horses trying to drag an overturned carriage had him rolling immediately to his feet, testing legs and arms and finding himself luckier than he deserved.
Somehow, however, there was little joy in the revelation. His carriage was wrecked, his horses panicked, and his body bruised.
Not to mention his pride.
“Clayborn!” He winced at the words when Adelaide appeared, having stopped her own carriage to check on him. “Are you all right?”
“I’m fine.” Approaching the wreck, he waved her back, not wanting to face her as he moved to calm the horses, unhitching the animals as quickly as possible and discovering, miraculously, that they were unharmed.
“You’re not fine!” she said. “You could have beenkilled.”
“I wasn’t, though,” he said, working for calm as he led the horses to a nearby tree before returning to crouch by the carriage and consider the tangled mess of the vehicle, turned on its side, halfway in a ditch on the side of the road.
“When you jumped—” she went on, coming to stand near him, unaware of the way his jaw tightened at herwords. Of the hot embarrassment that flooded him. “God, I thought you were—” She cut herself off, something caught in her throat.
He looked up at her.Was she worried about him?
“I thought you had—”
He didn’t like what he saw in her eyes. “Adelaide,” he said, firmly. “Look at me.” She did, staring down at him, and he held her pretty brown gaze for a moment before saying, “I am here.”
She nodded as he climbed into the wreckage to rescue his bags. It took longer than he would have liked, having to pick apart the detritus—so much for the brougham being the best conveyance for a modern gentleman, as the salesman had promised him. It had fallen apart like a child’s toy.
“What happened?” she asked, and he stilled at the words.
You happened.
I couldn’t look away from you.
Even then he stared at her, failing to learn his lesson.
“It appears you won the race,” he said. “Why not press on and claim your winnings?”
A room of her own. A soft bed.
No.He wouldn’t think of her in beds any longer.
“What? I am not leaving you.”
He ignored her as he continued his search, willing her to do as he asked. Finding his bag at long last, he climbed back out of the mess. “I do not require you to linger.”
Her brows furrowed, the fast waning light casting her skin in an orange glow. “You absolutely require me to linger. Who else is going to get you to the nearest inn?” She paused. “Who else is going to get you to your brother?”
