Gingerbread Bride

Chapter Six

Rick had ridden hard that day, and his leg was complaining bitterly. He'd left Haslemere at first light, making haste along the road to Oxford, compelled by an impulse he didn't understand. He'd lunched at the inn where Mary spent the night, and been alarmed to hear about Viscount Bosville's presence—and Bosville's departure not long after Mary.

He had no cause for concern, surely? Mary was not alone, and this was the end of the eighteenth century, not the middle ages.

Nevertheless, he called for a fresh horse and pressed even harder on Mary's trail.

They were clearly in no hurry. Two more posts later, he was only an hour behind them. This was the last post of the day. He'd see them at the next inn, if he didn't catch up with them beforehand.

Half an hour later, he crested a slight rise, and they were in sight ahead of him on the long straight road, toy-sized in the distance. He narrowed his eyes. What were those men on the side of the road doing? Throwing something?

Several somethings, and the horses reacted, moving from an amble to a panicked gallop in a stride. Rick urged his own horse to a gallop. Pray God the post boy could pull them up! No. There was the post boy, sitting on the side of the road rubbing his head. The assailants had disappeared. Rick didn't have time for them, anyway, and the post boy would have to fend for himself.

Somewhere, off in a compartment of his brain, was the urge to beat the stone throwers, to wail to the sky his fear for Mary. He allowed the emotions to lend him strength and separate him from his pain, but he had no time to pay further attention. Mary needed him.

His best chance was to leave the road; something galloping from behind would panic the team even more. If he could come up beside them, he might have a chance.

He set the hired horse at the first gate he saw, and thanked all the powers of heaven that the beast had a jump in it. More than one, for it gamely soared over several stone walls and hedgerows as they slowly gained on the post chaise.

In glimpses, as the ground on his side of the hedge rose, or as the hedge thinned, he saw his quarry. What was Mary doing? Climbing onto the luggage compartment at the front of the carriage? Did she have any idea how dangerous that was? Of course she did, but he'd be a fool to expect her to wait patiently in an out-of-control chaise bounding towards disaster. It was like her to climb out to see what she could do. She must have concluded there was nothing, for she edged backwards and disappeared again, but not before his brain had recorded an image of her legs that he knew would keep him awake many a fevered night.

Idiot. This was no time for lust. He needed a gate or a low point to get back onto the road at the horses' heads.

There. His horse was tiring, but gathered itself for one more effort and cleared the gate, with a jarring stumble on the other side. He ignored the effect of the sudden lurch on his leg, as he had ignored it on previous jumps, and urged the horse forward. Moments later, he had the bridle of the offsider and was urging the team to a halt.

He looked back at the carriage in time to see Mary jump down from the door, and couldn't help noting she'd dropped her skirts back to where they belonged. He dismounted, taking care to keep hold of the carriage horses, as she hurried towards him.

"Rick, I'm so pleased to see you. What happened to the post boy, do you know? What spooked the horses? What are you doing here?"

Now that the immediate danger was over, his leg hurt like hell. He opened his mouth to reply, but the world spun around him, and he clutched his horse's neck to stay upright.

"Polly, take their heads." Through a haze of pain, he could hear Mary taking over, and suddenly she was under his arm on his better side, supporting him. "I have you, Rick. Just a step. Here, and another."

"A minute," he gasped. "It's jarred. The leg. Not ready for jumping. Good horse, though."

Mary lowered him onto the slope at the side of the road, and was gone. He missed her. She felt good tucked into his side, his arm around her shoulders.

Then she was there again, holding his head against her chest with one hand while she held something to his mouth with another. His mouth flooded with brandy from the flask he carried in his saddle bag.

"Just stay still, Rick. You will be fine in a minute." She sounded calm and confident, but for the edge of a question in the last few words. Brave girl. He had always been able to count on Mary in a crisis.

He took another sip of brandy. Not too much. He would have to ride the horses to the nearest inn, though how he would mount, he had no idea.

Mary would not allow it.

"You will ride in the chaise, Rick, and I will have no argument. You are in no fit state to ride, and I will not have you hurting yourself more on my account. Besides, a fine mess Polly and I would be in if you fell off and the horses spooked again."

"Someone has to ride the horses," he protested.

"I will do it. Just to the nearest farmhouse, so you need not worry for me, Rick."

"Aye, aye, Captain," he managed, which made her smile, but didn't banish the anxious wrinkle between her brows.