by Dayna Quince
Edward watched them with glazed eyes, his breathing frantic.
“Justice will be done this night. That woman belongs to me.”
“Chadwick, let the man go,” Thorn said, his voice firm but calm.
Edward’s scrutiny zeroed in on Thorn. “You. You are a thief. My father gave you the opportunity of a lifetime, and you spat in his face.”
“It’s business, Chadwick. Your father lied to me. This land does not belong to him.”
“It will!” he screamed. “I’ve summoned the constable. He will see that things are put to right. Charlotte, I will forgive you, but you must know that this sort of behavior will not be tolerated. You belong to me now.”
“Lower your weapon,” Thorn said as he raised his. Pruitt was to his left, two pistols trained on Chadwick.
“Hold your weapons!” Another man appeared, brandishing his own weapon. Thorn recognized him from earlier at the inn.
“I am Mr. Mason, Constable of Faversham.” He slowly entered the fray, followed by Lord Shelding.
“This is not how we settle familial matters, Edward.” Lord Shelding glowered at his son.
Chadwick dropped his pistol to his side, and Thorn could hear the collective breath of relief.
“I demand justice. Constable Mason, arrest this man,” he shoved James to the ground.
“On what grounds, sir?” Constable Mason stepped forward and holstered his gun.
“He…he defied me.”
“He was trying to rape Miss Angelwood,” James growled.
“Liar!” Edward screamed and raised his gun again.
In a blur of action, Constable Mason tackled Edward to the ground, the pistol firing. Everyone ducked, and Charlotte screamed as she hit the ground under the weight of a mountain. She found herself looking up at Thorn.
“Are you all right?” he panted.
She nodded.
He slowly lifted off her and twisted around to see what became of Edward and Constable Mason. James was leaning over the constable and holding his hands to his shoulder. The crowd gathered around, with Captain Pruitt bending down to assist. “He’s been shot.”
“No, I swear I haven’t.” Constable Mason sat up and patted his shoulder. “The blood’s not mine.”
“Where’s Edward?” Charlotte asked.
“He took off into the hops,” James answered. Charlotte squeezed into the space beside him. “Where’s Kitty?”
“Still in the cabin. I wasn’t going to reach her in time, so I let myself be caught by that bloody lunatic so he wouldn’t find her.”
“Oh, James.” Charlotte stood and looked around for the one person who might shake some sense into his son, but Lord Shelding had disappeared, and now Edward was wounded.
“Grab torches, we have to find him,” Thorn instructed everyone. He went to Charlotte’s side. “I want you to wait inside with Perry.”
“I can’t. I need to find Kitty first and make sure she is safe. She’s waiting in the cabin.”
“Take Perry with you and a torch. Hurry.” He kissed her forehead and left her. She stood there, stunned by the very public display of his affection. She shook herself out of it and took the torch Perry offered her. She led the way, cognizant of the pistol tucked in Perry’s waistband.
They didn’t talk as Charlotte led him into the woods. She was too busy worrying about Thorn and what Edward might do next. She kept looking back until she couldn’t see the light from the torches anymore.
“It’s this way.” They moved carefully through the wood. The cabin loomed again. It looked completely dark, and there was only a hint of smoke in the air from the fire that Charlotte had lit earlier. Charlotte picked up her skirts and ran to the door. “Kitty?” she called out. “It’s me. I’ve come to fetch you.
The door opened. “And James?”
“He’s fine. But we must hurry back to Wildwood.”
Kitty stepped out, eyeing Perry warily. “And who might this be?”
“My name’s Perry, miss.” He held out his hand.
“An American!” Kitty brightened.
“He works for Mr. Thorn,” Charlotte added. “Come along.”
“This is all so very exciting.” Kitty walked beside Perry.
Charlotte begged to differ, but Kitty was young and obviously smitten by her rescuer.
She led them back to Wildwood, her heart easing its frantic pounding when she saw the lights of the torches weaving through the hops. Everything looked the same as they had left it. They navigated their way down the slope, coming to the edge of the hops yard. Charlotte wanted to be with Thorn. She was not eager to wait inside where she couldn’t see him.
“Take Kitty inside, please. I’m going to find Mr. Thorn.”
“He made it clear he wanted you in the house, ma’am.” Perry said.
“Well, he may be your boss, but he isn’t mine. Now off with you.” Torch in one hand, and skirt in the other, Charlotte set off down a hops row. The growth was so thick she could not see on the other side, but she could hear them.
Coming to the end of the row, she almost collided with two workers.
“’Tis not safe, Miss. Mr. Chadwick still has his pistol.”
“I’m looking for Mr. Thorn. Have you seen him?”
“He went to the western field.”
“Thank you.” Charlotte headed in the direction the man pointed.
She darted across the open yard, her torch flickering in protest to her speed. She slowed as she approached the western hops yard. No one else was searching here. It was darker, and there were no telltale shouts, or dogs, or flicking lights of torches to reassure her that she wasn’t alone.
“Thorn?” She called out as she stepped into the row. She lifted her torch high to light her way, careful to keep it away from the greenery. She moved slowly, feeling the chill of the night through her thin cotton dress.
Perhaps she should go back. If Thorn returned to the house and she wasn’t there, he’d be worried, and then he’d have them search for her as well. She didn’t want to be a nuisance. Because of her, his business was likely to suffer. Maybe her father was right all along. This land was cursed. Growing hops here was cursed. Nothing good had ever come from it, except…Thorn. Charlotte would never regret meeting him. More than that, she’d never regret falling in love with him, for wanting him the way she did, no matter how much her heart begged and her head argued. There was no right or wrong when it came to her feelings for him. They were all consuming. She loved him. No matter how hard it was, how much it hurt, or what the consequences were, she loved him.
Her one and only regret would be that he didn’t love her back. That was a wound she would take to her grave. She understood all those tales of unrequited love now. She’d always wondered why those characters hadn’t chosen to move on and find someone who would love them in return.
It wasn’t that simple.
She couldn’t turn this turmoil off. It was part of her now. A scar she would always carry.
“Thorn?” She called out again as she moved deeper into the yard. This was the lot farthest from the house. It ran right up to the edge of the forest. She halted as she got to the end of the road. Something caught her eye. There was a leaf that looked oddly darker compared to the others. She moved closer and brought her torch down to shed light on it. The leaf was smeared with a black substance. It glistened in the firelight.
“Is that oil?” She dabbed at it with her finger.
A dog’s whine answered her.
Fear slithered down her spine. She edged around the next row, holding out her torch. There, deep into the row, a shadow moved.
“Edward?” She hesitated, but then she drew closer. A dog stood beside him, and it growled as she came closer. She stopped. “Are you hurt?” Stupid question. He had to be the one bleeding.
He lay prone on the ground, and Charlotte feared he might be dead. “Come here, pup. There’s a good boy.” She patted her leg, trying to befriend the dog. He wagged his tail slowly and to
ok a hesitant step toward her.
“Not even my dogs are loyal to me.” A grunt came from the figure on the ground.
“Edward, you’ve been hurt. Let me get help. You need a doctor.”
“I need a fiancée who won’t betray me.”
“You can curse me all you want once a doctor has tended you.”
“No.” He crawled away from her. Charlotte sighed. He must be too weak to move. She went back to the edge of the row where she could be seen.
“I’ve found him! Fetch a doctor!”
“Bloody, stupid woman. I don’t want your help.”
She stared at his shadowed form. “Honestly, I don’t want to help you, but what kind of person would I be if I left you here to die?”
“An intelligent one?”
She could hear the sneer in his voice. She considered leaving him, but no. Her conscience would not let her live with that. She could hear men coming now. Soon she wouldn’t be alone with only a monster for company.
“Hold on, Edward.”
“That’s Mr. Chadwick, to you,” Edward grumbled then moaned in pain.
“Why not husband?” A steely voice said.
Charlotte spun toward the wood. Lord Shelding stepped out. He had a rifle now, and he was leading two horses.
“This is your final chance to remedy the trouble you’ve caused.”
“I beg your pardon?”
“I’ve got a special license. We’ll take Edward to Pastor Franklin right now, and you two will be married. After a brief consummation, it won’t matter if he dies.”
“Are you mad?” Charlotte gasped. “You still expect me to go along with your horrific plan?”
“Considering what I will do to you if you don’t, yes.”
“What could you possibly do to me now?” Charlotte bit her stupid tongue.
“My dear Miss Angelwood. I could ruin you. I will sue you for breach of engagement. Everything you have will be mine without your weak bloodline tainting my line.”
“You can’t think a judge will agree with you? You may bully your way around your house, and you certainly bullied my father, but the courts of law will not bend to you.”
“The laws always bend to Peers. I am a lord. I am untouchable.”
“You’re insane,” Charlotte returned. Soon more people would arrive. Any second, she’d be saved from whatever this man planned to do.
“Leave it alone, Father. I don’t want her.” Edward moaned.
“I don’t care what you want, you worthless swine. You’re as weak as your mother. All you had to do was bed her and keep her in line, and you couldn’t do that, now could you? It would serve me better if you died. I could sire another son, a better son.”
“Is there no limit to your black heart? How could you say that to your own child?”
Shelding shrugged.
“There’s no reasoning with men like him, Charlotte.” Thorn stepped out from another row.
Charlotte wanted to run into his arms, but she was afraid to move. Shelding lifted his rifle, but didn’t point it directly at Thorn. Shelding narrowed his eyes to dangerous slits. Thorn put up his hands.
“Am I worth hanging for? Is any of this worth dying for?” Thorn bargained.
“You know, I think you’re right. How about a new deal?” Shelding lowered the gun.
“Name your terms.” Thorn moved closer to Charlotte, slowly coming to her side. He took her hand and placed himself between her and Shelding.
“Wait.” Edward crawled to them. Charlotte watched, afraid he might do something when their backs were turned. Thorn reached for his gun.
“I dropped my pistol somewhere, I’m unarmed,” Edward slurred. He was shivering as he lay down a few feet from Charlotte. Charlotte couldn’t help it. She went to his side.
“Edward, you need help.” His face looked ghostly white in the light of her torch. “He’s dying!” she cried to Thorn.
“Back to business,” Shelding said. “Keep the girl. Marry her yourself and take the house and lands. We’ll negotiate a new percentage of profits from the hops.”
“Your son is dying, and all you can think about is hops?” Charlotte fumed. She rummaged through Edward’s coat, finding the source of his bleeding.
Shelding ignored her. Charlotte ripped a piece of her hem off and wadded it up to press to Edward’s wound. He let out a frightening moan as she pressed.
“I’m sorry, Edward. I never wanted to marry you, but I’m not willing to watch you die.”
He brought a blood-smeared hand to her cheek. His eyes met hers, glazed with pain. The light in them dimmed. “I always knew there was something special about you. I thought if I had it, I’d be special, too.”
A lump rose to her throat. She blinked away tears.
“Promise you’ll cry for me. I want to know one woman will cry for me when I die.”
“I will, as will your mother and Annette. James said she’s carrying your child. You have a reason to live Edward. You have a chance to be a father. A better father than your own.”
He swallowed. He was fading right before her eyes. More people arrived, Dr. Grant among them. Charlotte backed away, looking down at her blood-soaked hands. A wagon appeared and the workers lifted Edward into the back.
Thorn came to her side. Lord Shelding was at Edward’s side, attempting to look fatherly and concerned.
“Don’t you dare.” Hate filled her. “Don’t you dare pretend to care for him.”
Lord Shelding sneered at her. “I don’t care what a whore thinks. Your only value to me is the hops on your land.
“These hops?” She walked to the end of a row. She touched a cone, papery and dry. “These hops are all that you are about?”
“Yes.” Lord Shelding folded his arms. “Unlike you, they have the potential to make me very rich.”
Charlotte looked at Thorn. His eyes caught hers. His legacy, his future was in these hops, but as she stood here covered in blood, one of Shelding’s many victims tonight, she found that she hated these hops and all they represented.
“It’s a pity then.” She took a torch from a worker. “These hops are mine, on my land, and I can do with them as I please.” She touched the torch to the papery cone, and it sizzled as it caught fire. The men backed away. She was the monster now. But no one stopped her.
“What the devil are you doing?” Shelding bellowed from the cart. It lurched away, the mule pulling it becoming scared as the fire quickly spread along the rows. Charlotte set off three more rows and turned to face Shelding.
“You’re welcome to burn in hell with them, if you so choose.” Charlotte handed off the torch to a stunned worker and strolled back to the house, the heat of the growing fire at her back.
Chapter 19
July 15th 1823
Father,
I’m lost. I let myself be distracted. I lost sight of my purpose here. I let a woman get to me…
* * *
Crumpled and tossed in the hearth.
The cart pulled away, Constable Mason staying with Shelding and Chadwick. The workers dispersed. Thorn watched the carnage of the fire as he strolled back to the house.
He felt…nothing. Certainly, nothing close to what he should be feeling. She’d looked at him before she did it, but why? For permission? For his acceptance as she burned everything he built here to the ground? He searched himself for the anger he should feel, the disappointment, but he didn’t find it. He directed workers to watch the flow of the fire and make sure it didn’t spread beyond the yard. The dry, fibrous hops would burn quickly, and in the end, there would be nothing left.
No reason for him to stay.
He walked back to the house and entered through the terrace doors to the drawing room. Charlotte wasn’t there, but Pruitt, Perry, and the two Shelding manor staff were there.
“What happened?” Pruitt asked without preamble.
“Chadwick was found but it may be too late. He’s lost a lot of blood.”
“Do I smell smo
ke?” Perry asked.
Thorn nodded. “The hops yard is on fire,” Thorn said with no emotion. “It’s over. It’s all over.” He turned away then. He didn’t want to deal with their opinions now. He was struck by a bone-tired exhaustion, his feet dragging as he climbed the stairs. In the hall, he turned toward his room and found the door ajar. He entered and she was standing there, her hands shoved in the basin. She was staring at them.
Emotion hit him like an avalanche of relief and joy. He was moving before he knew it, and he wrapped his arms around her. “Thank God you’re safe,” he said into her hair. She was a rigid bundle of sticks in his arms, but he didn’t care. He held her tighter, waiting for this terror and joy to abate.
She relaxed in his arms, lifting her hands from the bloody water and drying them. She hugged his arms to her.
“I thought you’d hate me.”
“It isn’t within me to ever hate you, Charlotte.”
“But I destroyed it all. I ruined your brewery.”
“I don’t want it, love. I don’t want blood-soaked hops in my beer. I don’t want a business partner like Shelding. It was rotten from the beginning.”
“What will you do now?”
“I don’t know, I don’t really care. I just want to hold you, Charlotte. I want to hold you and not feel like you’re going to be ripped away from me at any moment.”
She turned in his arms, a feat since he was squeezing her so tightly.
“What will you do now?” he asked.
“I don’t know. I never got a chance to send my letters. They’re…” She patted her bodice. “Oh, they’re here, she wiggled out of his arms. He was reluctant to let her go. He watched her dig through her bodice and pull them out.
“I will post them tomorrow. I don’t want you going anywhere without me. Should Edward live, Shelding may still try to force the two of you to marry.”
She shrugged. “I can confidently say I don’t think Edward wants to marry me any longer. I think I proved too troublesome, though he did say some very sweet things before the doctor arrived.” She looked sad. Thorn didn’t like it. He shouldn’t be jealous of a man who may not live to see the sun rise. Her heart was so noble, so forgiving. He could learn from her if given enough time.
