Defiant (51 page)

But the true surprise would arrive the morning of Christmas Eve.

The farm had so many needs, and Sarah had three thousand pounds. It did not seem right for her to sit upon such a sum of money and not use at least some of it for the betterment of the farm. To that end, she’d conspired with their neighbor, Master Fairley, with the help of his good wife Mary, to have a new plow, a new scythe, and a prize bull purchased in Albany and delivered to the farm. The plow and scythe were sorely needed, and the bull would enable them to breed the cows without paying for the use of another farmer’s bull, helping to save coin and keep them in milk, cheese, and beef.

She had often heard the men speak of how much they needed—

“Artair, Beatan,
uist
!” Iain’s voice interrupted Sarah’s thoughts. “They’ve been actin’ oddish all afternoon.”

Rather than quieting down, the dogs began to growl low in their throats.

Sarah heard chair legs scrape against the puncheon floor as the men stood. Someone took hold of a musket. And Sarah’s pulse jumped.

Little William seemed to be asleep. She took him from her breast and laid him in his cradle, covering him with a warm blanket and adjusting her shift.

From below came Annie’s voice. “What is it?”

The dogs growled and scratched.

Her shawl wrapped tightly around her shoulders, Sarah walked down the stairs to find all three men with muskets in hand, standing near the door.

Connor reached for his bearskin coat. “Let’s loose the dogs and have a look round. ’Tis likely that badger’s come back to dig at the chicken coop.”

Iain patted the dogs’ shaggy necks. “Are you ready, boys?”

Connor gave Sarah a reassuring wink, lifted the bar from the door, and opened it, the dogs pushing past him and running into the night. He started to follow them, when something stopped him. He bent down, stood upright again, and turned, holding something in his hand—a piece of parchment and…

The cracked black king.

Sarah ran to Connor, took the chess piece from his hands, and ran out the door, forgetting that she was wearing naught but her nightshift and shawl.

“Uncle William!” She saw footprints in the snow leading toward the forest and ran, the dogs bounding ahead of her. “Uncle William!”

Cold wind pierced the cotton of her shift, driving snow against her skin, her feet already chilled to the bone.

“Uncle William! Please come back!”

“Sarah! Are you daft? Come inside!” Connor shouted after her.

She ran on, snow churning like icy sand beneath her feet. “Uncle William, please don’t go! Come back!”

Strong arms caught her, held her fast. “Sarah—”

“Uncle W-William!” She sobbed out her uncle’s name, tears spilling down her face, her teeth now chattering from the cold. “Pl-please don’t go!”

“You’re barely out of childbed!” Connor lifted her into his arms and carried her back toward the house. “I willna let you catch fever or bleed to death on the ground.”

Morgan met them halfway with a bearskin and draped it over her, shouting over the wind to Amalie, who stood in her own doorway, a baby in her arms. “Bar the door, and stay inside! I’ll come as soon as I can!”

Sarah shivered in Connor’s arms. “H-he’s out th-there. I—I know he is!”

“Then let us find him.
You
stay by the fire where it’s warm.” Connor carried her inside, depositing her gently in a rocking chair Annie had placed in front of the fire. “Thank you, Annie. See to her, aye?”

And then he was gone.

W
illiam watched MacKinnon carry Sarah back inside, leave her with Lady Anne, then hurry with his two brothers to the barn, no doubt on their way to saddle horses.

He found himself smiling—surely the first time he’d smiled in months.

Sarah had recognized the black king and had come for him. She’d cried out his name. She’d run out the door, looking young and beautiful and alive, to find him.

She’d wanted him to stay.

The moment he’d heard her voice, he’d felt a sense of peace, sure she’d forgiven him and certain at last that these months of hell had bought something precious.

Sarah was safe. She was alive.

And she would remember him.

“My lord, we must go!”

It was time to depart.

He turned to look one last time upon the farmhouse, but his vision had blurred again, his throat almost too tight to speak. “Good-bye, Sarah.”

B
lanket around her shoulders, Sarah stood when the door opened, expecting Connor to lead Uncle William inside. But only Connor and Iain entered, their faces red from the cold, snow clinging to their hair, their lashes, their bearskin coats.

Morgan stood on the step. “I must be headin’ home to my own sweet wife. I can see her watchin’ out the window. She must be worried. Good night.”

And Morgan was gone, the door shut behind him.

“We found two sets of horse tracks in the forest across from the house.” Iain removed his coat, shook it, then hung it on its peg. “The snow was well tramped down, so they must have been waitin’ there for a long time. They vanished down the road, the horses at a near gallop.”

Connor hung his coat on the peg next to Iain’s. “We followed for a time, but the storm grew worse and the tracks harder to see. When we reached the crossroads, we couldna tell which direction they’d taken.”

He looked into Sarah’s eyes. “I’m sorry, Sarah.”

“All this time I thought he was dead.” Sarah sank back into the rocking chair, clutching the black king to her breast. “Why did he not knock? Why did he not answer or come to me when I called for him?”

“We cannae ken for certain it was him.” Iain took a cup of hot tea from Annie.

“Aye.” Annie looked up at her husband, handing a second cup to Connor. “We can.”

Then Annie told the men what she’d told Sarah. “The day you were shot fightin’ Bute, I went to see Lord William. I begged him to release you from service, and, when he refused, I knocked over his chess board. The pieces scattered on the floor. This one must have broken.”

“I saw him with it many times.” Sarah looked down at the chess piece in her hands. “He kept it in his pocket, often worrying it with his fingers when he was pensive.”

“So that’s how you kent it was his.” Connor sat at the table beside Iain.

“Why did he not come inside?” Did he not wish to see her?

Connor seemed to think this over. “There’s no easy way to say this, so I’ll just say it. If he’s been a captive all this long while, he has surely suffered torture. He might not be the man you remember. Perhaps he didna wish to be seen.”

Sarah’s stomach seemed to fall to the floor, tears gathering in her eyes again. She could not stand to think of Uncle William suffering long months of torment while she’d been contented here. “I would have welcomed him no matter what his condition.”

But now Connor’s attention was on the letter. Sarah had forgotten about it. Connor opened it, read it, his eyes closing for a
moment. Whether it was grief or anger on his face, she could not tell. Without saying a word, he handed the letter to her.

Sarah took it and looked down at the pages, the writing unfamiliar to her.

Sarah’s heart was already raw, and now it was all too much. Without saying a word, she stood, set the letter on the table, and hurried upstairs.

C
onnor gave Sarah a few minutes to herself then followed her up the stairs, feeling as if a shadow had just passed over his heart. Wentworth had done for Sarah what Connor could never have accomplished—he’d uncovered the truth about Lady Margaret’s journals, redeemed Sarah’s reputation, and restored her place in society even if she were not there to take it. If it hadn’t been for the fact that she was supposed to be dead, she might have returned to London now that she was not with child.

Of course, Connor would never have allowed her to go. She was his wife in the eyes of God—and the mother of his son. She belonged with him.

Did she regret that? Had learning she’d been redeemed made Sarah long for her life of luxury, of days at court and nights in the Theatre Royal? The poor lass didn’t yet have a wedding band—or at least she wouldn’t until Christmas Day, when he planned to surprise her.

Dinnae be a fool, lad. She loves you. You ken she loves you.

He found her lying on the bed, looking down at little William, who slept swaddled in blankets beside her. There were fresh tears on her cheeks, but when she saw Connor, she smiled.

He walked over to her and sat on the edge of the bed behind her, sliding his hand up the soft skin of her arm. “Did he wake? I didna hear him cry.”

“No, he did not wake.” She looked down at their sleeping son again, a mother’s love shining on her face. “I just wanted to be near him.”

“This has been a hard night for you.” It had near broken his heart to hear her crying for her uncle and see her running barefoot through the snow.

The joy on her face dimmed. “I cannot bear thinking of what Uncle William might have suffered for my sake, and I can’t abide the fact that he would not come in and speak with me. There’s nothing that would make me ashamed of him or afraid to see him.”

“He’s a prideful man, Sarah. I doubt he feared how
you
might react. ’Tis more likely he feared how it would make him feel to be seen.”

“What a shame if that be the case, for I should dearly have loved to see him again.” Her voice quavered. “I would have loved for him to see our son.”

Connor wasn’t certain Wentworth would have cared to see William, given how very much he’d hoped Sarah would lose the child, but Connor kept that thought to himself. He’d made it a hard-and-fast rule that no one speak ill of the man in Sarah’s presence. “At least he is alive. Take comfort in that.”

She seemed to consider this, then gave a wistful smile. “I was pleased to read that Margaret’s art is getting the attention it deserves, though I wish she were here to see it.”

“She knows, Sarah. She knows.”

Her smile faded, her gaze still on sleeping William. “I am relieved, too, that the truth was revealed and Denton exposed. It seems I would not have had to marry him after all. Uncle William would have seen to that.”

With those words, she struck at the heart of the uncertainty troubling Connor.

He needed to know. “When you read that letter, did you find yourself wishin’ you could return to London? Some part of you must miss your family and the luxury of the life—”

She pressed her fingers to his mouth and sat up, bringing her face close to his. “What luxuries did I have? Gowns? Jewels? Such things are hollow. I spent every day of my life there in dreariness, hoping for a moment when I might be allowed to play music, pained by guilt because I could not be the daughter my mother wanted. My sisters and I were always together, and
yet I never knew what was in their hearts, nor did they know what was in mine.

“Here, I play music whenever I wish, and you all share in my joy. Annie and Amalie and I—we laugh and talk together. We share our thoughts, our fears, our dreams. They are my true sisters. Here, I have brothers, too—Morgan, Iain, Joseph. I have a newborn son I cherish, and a strong and handsome husband who loves me so much that he would gladly have given his life to spare mine. For me,
these
are luxuries. Why should I wish to leave this place and return to a home where I am not loved?”

At these words, Connor felt the shadow inside him begin to dissipate. “But surely your parents love you. The letter said they felt deep remorse. Do you no’ miss them?”

Sarah shook her head, her hair in a tangle about her shoulders. “Lady Margaret told me never to reveal my true self to those who do not truly love me, but I think she had it turned around. Those who would not know me
cannot
truly love me in the first place.”