Cardiff Siblings 01 - Seven Minutes in Devon (38 page)

“
That’s not what
happened.”

Emma spun on him and jabbed
a finger into his chest. “That is
precisely
what just happened. You
can’t switch from hating me with every fiber of your being one day,
to gleefully picking fights with me another day, to
supposedly
loving
me the very next. It doesn’t work that way.”

By normal standards, she
probably had a point. But how was love ever
normal
? It just happened, whether you
wanted it to or not, whether you were ready for it or
not.

“
Love can’t just fit into a
perfect little box, Emma.”

“
I’m not trying to fit it
into a box,” she muttered, fumbling with the ties of her stays.
Finally, she got the ties to settle into place and gave them a hard
tug. “I’m trying to avoid ending up as heartbroken as your sister
was when Lord Stoneham betrayed her trust.”

“
You’re not going to end up
heartbroken.”

“
You’re right. I won’t.”
Emma pulled her dress over her head. “I’m not going to let you hurt
me. We both know how you’ve felt about me all this
time.”

His misplaced hatred.

But of course, she’d known. She had to
have known. Aidan hadn’t made any effort at all to hide his
feelings toward her in all that time. She’d be a fool to believe
him now—now, when he finally saw the truth of what he felt for
her.

She was almost fully clothed again,
though shoddily so, and he had hardly done more than pull on his
breeches. Aidan worked faster to make himself
presentable.

“
I won’t hurt you. Christ,
Emma. I love you.”

Lifting a brow, she said, “Is that so?
For some reason, I have a much easier time imagining my own
interpretation of what took place in here is closer to correct.”
She reached for one of her half-boots, tripping over her skirts
which were still tangled about her knees in the process.

Aidan caught her and set her to
rights, his jaw grinding together all the while. “I don’t know what
else you want me to say. I’ve told you I love you. How am I
supposed to prove it to you if you don’t believe it?”

This time, finally, she looked up at
him—truly looked at him—with a tear shining in her eye. “That’s
just it,” she said a moment later. “I don’t know that I’ll ever be
able to believe such a thing. There’s been so much animosity, and I
swear to you I’ve never understood a lick of it. How should I
believe you’ve put all that well and truly in the past? How should
I believe you love me?”

He knew because of the ferocious
pounding of his pulse anytime he was with her. He knew because of
the irrational jealousy he felt, which made him want to rip Sir
Henry’s head from his shoulders any time the baronet was alone with
Emma. He knew because even when he wasn’t with her, he thought
about her and wanted to be with her.

But Aidan didn’t have the first
inkling what to say in response to her question. None of those
things were tangible. None of them were things she could grasp or
feel or experience.

When he didn’t respond, Emma shook her
head. “They’ll be back from hawking soon. We should return to the
house before we’re missed.”

As her sure fingers closed the series
of tiny buttons along the back of her gown, Aidan felt like she was
closing the door on any chance they could have a true marriage. He
felt like she was stabbing his heart with a hot poker, over and
over again. It wasn’t just about having her in his bed. Not any
longer. He wanted to spar with her over books, and to laugh
together over her attempts at painting. He wanted to watch her
collect all of the broken and damaged people around her, fix them,
and send them on their way whole again.

Yet he was perhaps the most broken of
them all, and she was merely breaking him further.

“
Of course,” he said. His
voice sounded flat to his own ear. Emotionless.

He was about as far from being free
from emotion as was humanly possible. It would be a blessing just
now, because there were so many of the blasted things coursing
through his veins he felt like he might explode from them at any
moment. Love, fear, rejection, anger… There were a great many he
couldn’t even name, but they were powerful and overwhelming, and he
worried they might topple him if he weren’t careful.

Nevertheless, Aidan finished donning
his clothes and helped Emma to repair hers, so it wouldn’t appear
that anything was amiss. Then together, they left the hermitage and
began the silent journey back to the main house.

As they came out of the path onto the
main lawn, they were greeted by chaos. The party had returned from
hawking, and they crowded the vast expanse: houseguests, horses,
and dogs were milling about, with servants rushing amongst them
from one to the next.

No, milling about wasn’t quite right.
They were racing, as though in a panic.

Perhaps someone had been injured on
the hunt? But if so, why hadn’t they taken the injured person
inside and sent for a doctor? No, that couldn’t be.

Aidan glanced over at Emma. Her lips
were pursed together and her eyes held an intense sense of purpose.
She knew something was very wrong, as well. Without a word to one
another, they increased their pace.

When they drew near the gathered
crowd, Aidan spotted Niall and started to veer them in his
brother’s direction—but Sir Henry Irvine stepped into his path and
blocked his way.

“
Miss Hathaway, thank
goodness. I’ve been looking for you—”

That was as far as the baronet got
before Aidan’s fist landed squarely on his nose. “I warned you to
stay away from my intended,” he growled, even as Irvine toppled
over to the ground with blood gushing past the fingers covering his
nose.

He’d had more than enough of Irvine
trying to get close to Emma. Every time Aidan turned his back,
Irvine was trying to wheedle his way closer to her, like he would
steal her out from under Aidan’s nose. That wasn’t going to
happen.

He hauled Irvine up by his shirt and
pulled his free arm back to swing at the would-be-usurper’s face
again.

“
No!” Emma tried to rush
in, but Aidan jerked Irvine away from her.

“
And you,” he shouted at
her. “You may not love me, but you can damned well honor our
betrothal by staying away from him.”

He pulled back for another blow and
had nearly connected again when Niall caught his arm.

“
It’s Morgan. She’s
missing.”

Just as quickly as it had all begun,
Aidan dropped his hold on Sir Henry, and the baronet collapsed to
the ground. Emma rushed forward to see to him, her heart pounding
all the while.

Morgan was missing? How could that
have happened?

She ripped off a strip of her
petticoat and pressed it to his nose. “Hold that in place,
please.”

He nodded and kept the cloth where
she’d placed it, but instantly pushed himself to his feet then
reached down to help Emma up.

When she released his hand, it was
Aidan that she focused upon—his face contorted with anguish and
pain and fear and anger, all of it so intense and acute she felt it
radiating from him despite the distance between them.

She reached for his hand, hoping to
feel for broken bones or see to any cuts it might have, but he
snatched it away from her.

“
We have to organize a
search party.” He said it to Lord Trenowyth, not to Emma. He
wouldn’t even look at her. “All too soon it will be dark, and then
we’ll have no hope of finding her before morning.”

Her heart cracked a bit, but now was
not the time to wallow in her own pity, despite the fact that this
only served to prove what she’d realized in the hermitage. He
didn’t love her. He might never be able to love her, so it didn’t
matter how desperately her heart yearned for him. Her love would
never be enough. He was like a wounded animal, lashing out to hurt
anyone in his path before they could hurt him any more than he
already had been. He didn’t know how to let her love
him.

Emma blinked back tears and tried to
focus. All around her, the men were gathering into groups,
preparing to go out into the wood. She wanted to with them, but
Aidan would never allow her to. Not with as angry as he
was.

Besides, he’d already moved away from
her, with David and Lord Trenowyth on each side of him. Vanessa
came over and put her hands on Emma’s shoulders, trying to urge her
inside with the other ladies, and Serena took one of Emma’s hands
in her own.

“
Come inside,” Serena said.
“They’ll find her. I know they will.”

But she couldn’t just sit and wait
while Morgan was missing. What if she was in trouble? What if she
was hurt and needed help? Wouldn’t more people searching be
better?

Emma never should have let Morgan go
out hawking without her. Sir Henry and Lord Trenowyth were sure to
try to help her more than Morgan would have wanted, and so she was
bound to try to go off on her own, to prove herself capable as long
as she had Kingley by her side.

“
Kingley!” The word came
out of Emma’s mouth so suddenly, it startled even her. She spun
around, breaking free from Serena and Vanessa’s grips, and raced to
where Sir Henry was still standing alongside Mr.
Deering.

“
Where is Kingley?” she
asked frantically. “He would never have left her. He would never
have let anyone hurt her.”
Not even
herself.
The bond between the two had grown
immeasurably in a very short amount of time. That dog would do
anything for Morgan. He wouldn’t ever leave her side.

Sir Henry shook his head, his eyes
downcast. “We haven’t seen him, either. They’re both missing. That
was what I was going to tell you.”

What he would have told her, had Aidan
not attempted to cosh in his face.

Emma blinked back her tears. This was
no time for tears. She needed to be level-headed and calm, or she’d
never sort out this mess.

Finally, she nodded. “Find him, Sir
Henry. Find Kingley, and he’ll help you find Morgan.”

“
I’ll do everything I can,”
he assured her.

Then Serena took Emma’s hand again and
turned her around. The two of them followed the rest of the women
into the main house. To sit. And wait. And feel utterly, completely
useless.

Morgan wouldn’t try to hurt herself
again, would she? It couldn’t have all been feigned.

No matter how much Emma tried to
convince herself of this, the fear wouldn’t go away. Worst of all,
she’d been off with Aidan, and they’d been oblivious to whatever
Morgan’s needs might have been.

His feet felt heavy, like he was
wearing stones upon them instead of boots. But he couldn’t slow
down. He couldn’t stop.

Aidan had long ago broken
off the main path, with David at his side. If Morgan had somehow
gone this way, she wouldn’t be able to find her way back to the
trail. And if she’d been
on
the main path, there was no explanation for how
she would have been separated from the rest of the party. For how
she would have gotten lost.