Cardiff Siblings 01 - Seven Minutes in Devon (42 page)

Emma wasn’t certain how long she sat
there, almost in tears with her arms wrapped around knees that had
been drawn up to her chest for warmth. All she knew was that she
was cold and tired, and she’d failed Morgan. And Aidan. She’d
failed everyone, and morning couldn’t come soon enough.

But then she saw a light off in the
distance, bobbing up and down it seemed. That couldn’t be. She
rubbed her eyes, but the light remained. “Hello?” she called, even
as she pushed to her feet again. “Over here!” she cried and took
off as fast as she could go in the direction of the
light.

Something ran into her feet—or perhaps
her feet ran into something—and she fell forward, nearly flying
through the open air before smacking the entire front of her body
hard against the ground.

She moaned, certain she’d done herself
significant harm. Her left arm throbbed in pain, and her head felt
like she’d cracked it open. Or maybe she only wished she had
cracked it open. Either way, it wasn’t pleasant in the
slightest.

She tried to roll over, but it was no
use. Every inch of her body ached like she couldn’t remember it
ever aching before. Moving so much as a muscle was more than she
could ask of herself at the moment. She lay there, moaning but not
doing much else.

Oh, heavens. What if that light had
belonged to whoever had tried to harm Morgan? Would they come after
Emma now? She should have thought before she acted.

Until the light she’d seen came to
her, floating above her head as though it were a supernatural
creature of sorts. It hurt her head, and nearly blinded her. Emma
blinked, squinting up into the brightness.

“
Is she all
right?”

Emma knew that voice without a doubt,
so soft and melodic. It belonged to Morgan. But how was that
possible? Morgan was missing, and Emma was supposed to find her—not
the other way around.

Then a rough, wet tongue licked the
side of her face.

“
Kingley?” Emma said on a
groan.

“
I think she’ll be fine,
once we get her back to the estate and see to her
injuries.”

A man’s voice. She knew him
too.

“
Can you carry the lantern
for me, Lady Morgan? I’ll have to carry her, and you can hold my
arm as we go back.”

Then his strong arms went beneath her,
and he lifted her up into the air. Emma had enough wits about her
that she was able to put her arm across his shoulders, to better
support her weight in his arms.

Kingley grumbled and growled when
Morgan put her hand on the man’s arm, as he’d instructed her to do,
but the dog didn’t attack.

Emma squinted into the man’s face as
the lantern light swung near.

“
Lord Jacob?” she
rasped.

“
We’ll have you back to the
estate safely in no time, Miss Hathaway,” he said firmly. “Try not
to worry yourself.”

Then he took off walking, with Morgan
at his side and Kingley at hers, growling his menace at the man
he’d never liked with every step he took.

They’d been traveling some minutes,
Lord Jacob and Morgan talking all the while, by the time the
pounding in Emma’s head calmed enough she could concentrate on what
was happening around her. The events of the night left her so
confused; however, she feared that attempting to sort it all out
would only leave her with a more blistering headache than she
already had.

“
Lord Jacob,” she finally
asked, her voice far more tentative than she would have liked, “how
did you find Morgan?”

He let out a mirthless chuckle. “Your
Mr. Cardiff woke the entire household sometime after we’d all taken
to our beds. He was yelling about how Lady Morgan had been
attacked, and now you’d gone missing as well.”

Aidan had been upset she was gone? How
did he know? He couldn’t have discovered her absence unless he’d
gone to her chamber…but why?

“
At that point, it was
decided as many men who were willing would go out again, with
lanterns and torches and whatever else could be found, in order to
locate you both.”

They were all out looking for her,
because she’d been so impatient and irresponsible. What if someone
else had been hurt in the dark? Emma would never be able to live
with herself if that had occurred. She never should have left her
chamber. She should have waited until day, like they had
planned.

But she hadn’t, and now
what?

“
Kingley found me first,”
Morgan said softly. Her voice seemed to calm Kingley somewhat, as
his growls lessened in intensity. “But he made such noise that only
a few moments later Lord Jacob arrived.”

“
Lady Morgan was
frightened, of course,” he continued, “after being lost alone in
the woods for so long, but she was unharmed. We started to return
to the estate when we heard you crashing through the woods and
moaning in pain.”

Lord Jacob was beginning to labor with
continuing to carry her—his breaths came too rapidly, though she
doubted he would ever voice a complaint.

Nonetheless, Emma shifted a bit, to
determine if she could walk. Her legs and feet ached, certainly,
but she was fairly certain she could manage.

“
Set me on my feet,” she
said after a moment.

“
Certainly not. Not until
all your injuries have been examined.”

“
I can walk,” Emma
insisted, more firmly this time.

Eventually, he relented and set her
down. Even so, he put an arm around her waist for support. Once she
was walking again, she was glad for it. She couldn’t remember a
time she felt less steady.

That wasn’t entirely true. Aidan left
her feeling unsteady at every turn, but she couldn’t help but wish
it was his arm supporting her now. Lord Jacob’s arms were strong
and sure, but Aidan’s made her feel safe. She felt so conflicted,
wanting to get back to him as quickly as possible to reassure him
she was fine, and wishing she could delay their reunion as long as
possible, since she couldn’t be certain of what his reaction would
be when he saw her.

The most perplexing part of it all was
that, no matter how easily he had blamed her again, she still loved
him. She only wished he could love her equally.

But what if he did? What if what he’d
said to her had been the truth?

They walked along for some time in
silence, aside from the low rumblings coming from Kingley because
of Lord Jacob’s presence. By the time they returned to the main
path, however, the curiosity that had been niggling at Emma’s mind
for quite some time became too much for her to bear.

“
Morgan?” she asked
tentatively. “What happened?” There was no need to be more specific
with her question. Morgan would know what she meant.

“
Kingley and I had been
walking along with Mr. Deering, some distance behind the others.
One of the men called out ahead of us, asking Mr. Deering to come
to his assistance. I told him to go on, that Kingley and I would be
along at our leisure. He did, promising he would return to us in
short order. He’d been gone for ten minutes or so, and Kingley and
I had been wandering around, listening to the sounds of nature,
when someone whistled. Kingley took off running, and I was only
able to keep up for so long. Eventually, I turned my ankle and let
go of Kingley’s lead, and then I was all alone. I called for him,
but he didn’t come back. I had no choice but to wait for Mr.
Deering or someone else from the party to find me. My ankle feels
better now…”

“
Good heavens! Do you know
who whistled for Kingley?”

The path before them widened. They
were close to the estate. Close to warmth and comfort. Close to
Aidan. Emma’s pulse roared in her ears from the
realization.

“
I haven’t a clue,” Morgan
said. “It would have to be someone he knows and likes, or he
wouldn’t have gone to them.”

As though to prove her point, Kingley
growled at Lord Jacob again.

“
But there is no possibly
means of knowing how many people from the village he knows and is
comfortable with,” Morgan went on. “He’d been on his own until you
took him under your wing.”

A few minutes later, they emerged onto
the Heathcote Park lawn. Lord Jacob called out, “I’ve found them!”
Instantly, the heads of everyone gathered on the lawn spun in their
direction, and chaos ensued.

Servants rushed to them with blankets
and hot drinks. David wrapped two blankets around Emma and carried
her the rest of the way. Lord Trenowyth did the same with Morgan
while Lord Jacob rejected the hot tea offered by a
servant.

“
Brandy,” he said. “And
keep it coming.”

“
Here, Kingley,” Mr.
Deering said, and the dog went straight to him. “I found your lead
out in the woods—not a flaw on the thing.” A moment later, the
leather was back around Kingley’s neck. He’d stopped his growling,
now that he was with Mr. Deering and not with Lord
Jacob.

Everyone kept rushing around, trying
to take care of all of their needs at once—but the one person Emma
strained to see more than anyone else never appeared. No matter how
hard Emma tried to find him, Aidan was nowhere to be
seen.

“
Mr. Cardiff?” she asked
David while he and Vanessa tried to warm Emma’s skin. “Where is
he?”

David shook his head. “He hasn’t
returned from the woods yet. He’s the last one we’re waiting
on.”

The relief she’d felt at being back to
safety once again deflated, and her chest felt tight with worry.
The night would not be kind to him. The clouds that had gathered
earlier still clung to the night sky, thick and heavy and
ominous.

Her thoughts kept returning to one
thing: why would a man who hated her so thoroughly be out risking
his own life and safety in order to find her?

He does love
me
. She was sure of it all the way through
to her bones.

Emma stood, moving to where she could
see the tree line. Until Aidan came out, she wouldn’t
budge.

Thunder rattled the sky overhead, but
still Aidan had found nothing but Emma’s discarded candlestick.
Still, it meant he was on the right path. She had been there at
some point in the night, though he had no way of knowing how long
ago—or what direction she’d gone when she left there.

For two hours after finding the damned
thing, he’d kept looking, circling around the spot in search of
another sign. Something. Anything.

But now, he knew he had no choice but
to go back. The heavens were preparing to open up and release a
torrent, and he’d lose the bit of light he had from his lantern.
Feeling like the worst sort of failure alive, Aidan turned around
and made for the main path.

He hadn’t just failed Morgan, now he’d
failed Emma, too. Somehow, the realization that he’d failed Emma
struck him deeper in the gut than he’d been prepared for. It wasn’t
just tonight that he’d failed her—as long as he’d known her, he had
let her down over and over again.

A few cold drops hit him just as he
reached the well-travelled trail, so he increased his pace. The
entire way back to the estate, Aidan kept berating himself over and
over again for his poor treatment of Emma, all the while searching
his mind for a plan of action for what he’d do when he finally
found her again.

Groveling for forgiveness seemed his
best option. Not that he ever groveled. But given the
circumstances, this seemed as good a time as any to try his hand at
it. And then he’d apologize. Then he’d tell her he loved her, and
he’d repeat as many times as it took for her to believe
him.

The closer he got to Heathcote Park,
the louder the thunder grew overhead. When the wind picked up and
blew out his lantern, Aidan ran.

He didn’t stop until the end of the
path opened out onto the lawn. Lightning flashed in the sky,
illuminating the scene before him.

Morgan
.

She was huddled in blankets and being
carried back to the house by Niall, but there wasn’t a doubt in
Aidan’s mind that it was his sister. Her blonde hair shimmered in
the burst of light, a piece of brilliance amidst the darkness
surrounding her.