“Oh, certainly. I understand. What’s in this trunk is your life’s work, and I’m just the useless fellow traveling with you this week. Of course, Francine’s safety comes first.”
“No.” She shook her head so hard, her spectacles went crooked. “That’s not fair. You’re twisting my words. Colin, listen. In that frantic moment in the carriage, yes—I might have risked my own life to save this trunk. But you must believe me when I tell you this. I did not mean to risk yours. That’s why I came back.”
He nodded slowly. Hard to argue further, when she put it that way.
Truly, what could he say? Admit that he’d been harboring some absurd male fantasy of her running through the woods to save him, hair flowing loose behind her, br**sts heaving with every pace . . . aided by helpful songbirds chirping directions . . . simply because she’d known in her heart that he needed her help? Because the moment the Gatesheads’ carriage had rolled away, she’d realized that science meant nothing—absolutely nothing—to her without him, and now she would fall at his feet and beg to be his sultry-lipped love slave forevermore?
No. Of course not. She’d come back because it was expedient to her goals, and the decent thing to do. She was both driven and loyal, as ever. Nothing between them had changed.
Damn it.
He rose to his feet and took one of the trunk handles in his hand. “We need to be moving. The young one I clobbered won’t give chase. He’ll be too busy running for his own life. But once his associates realize I’m missing . . .
“Oh dear.” She lifted her side of the trunk. “They might be after us.”
Chapter Seventeen
They walked on and on through those woods, carrying Francine between them. By the position of the afternoon sun at their backs, Minerva knew they were traveling north. They hadn’t crossed any large bodies of water, so she assumed they were still on British soil. Beyond that, she could not have said. She wasn’t sure Colin knew, either.
Goodness, had it really been just that morning when she’d plunked herself on the side of the road and declared she could not walk another step? Colin had insisted she had the strength in her, and it annoyed her to admit he’d been right. She’d walked miles and miles farther now, with nothing to eat since last night’s dinner.
Putting one boot before the other required all her powers of concentration. Hunger dogged her every step, gnawing at her from the inside.
“I’ll be damned.” Colin stopped in his tracks. “And here I thought I hated the country.”
Minerva looked up. They’d entered a clearing. A wide, green meadow in the middle of the forest. The entire space was carpeted with bluebells. Thousands upon thousands of sweetly curving green stalks, their tips heavy with sprays of blue-violet blossoms. The sunlight shone from above and slanted through the trees, catching the blooms at different angles. The whole scene sparkled.
It was magical.
Colin said, “Even I, jaded as I am, have to admit that’s bloody lovely.”
Minerva was so famished, all she could think to reply was, “Do you suppose they’re edible?”
He laughed. She smiled. And just like that, their mood lightened. The highwaymen were behind them. They were healthy and whole, and they still had Francine. Her stomach might be empty, but a sense of hope swelled within her breast.
Perhaps all was not lost.
As they strode through the meadow, she had the eerie sensation of walking atop waves. Except this was a sea of petals, not saltwater. Her toe caught on a fallen branch, and she stumbled a bit.
“Are you all right?” Colin asked.
She nodded. “I was just distracted. Wondering how much loam is in this soil.”
“What?”
He set down his side of the trunk. Minerva did the same.
“You know,” she said. “Loam. A mix of clay and sand. In order for the soil to support this many bluebells, it would—”
“You’re standing in the middle of this”—he spread his arms wide to indicate Nature’s splendor—“and you’re thinking about loam in the soil? You spend far too much time staring at the ground.”
Rounding the trunk, Colin plucked her off her feet. With gentle strength, he tumbled her into the bluebells. She lay flat on her back, breathless and dizzy from the sudden inversion. From the sudden nearness of him.
He lay down next to her. “There. Have a rest. Look up at the sky for a change.”
Minerva stared up from the uneven ground. Her heartbeat drummed in her ears, and a crushed green scent engulfed her senses. The grasses and bluebells towered over her, swaying in the gentle breeze and dripping loveliness. Above everything, the sky hovered brilliant and blue. Nearly cloudless, save for a few wispy, changing puffs of white that were apparently too proud to mimic rabbits or dragons or sailing ships.
“What am I supposed to be seeing?” she asked.
“I don’t know. What do people see when they gaze at the sky? Inspiration? Beauty?” She heard him sigh. “Truth be told, this view always intimidated me. The sky’s so vast. I can’t help but feel it has expectations of me. Ones I’m already failing.” He was silent for a long moment. “It reminds me of your eyes.”
She dug her elbow into his side. “My eyes are brown. And my back’s growing damp. This is definitely very loam-rich soil. I just needed to look at the sky to realize it.”
With a chuckle, he rolled over and pinned her with one leg. “Do you know, you are the most surprising woman.”
Her breath caught. “You have a way of surprising me, too. Not always pleasantly.”
“If surprises were always pleasant, there wouldn’t be much surprise in them.”
“I suppose that’s true.”
He brushed a few wisps of hair from her face, then removed her spectacles and laid them atop the trunk.
Minerva’s pulse pounded as he slowly lowered his head and kissed . . . the tip of her nose.
She blinked up at him, trying hard to focus and read his expression. Was it teasing or affectionate? She couldn’t tell. “Why did you do that?”
“Because you weren’t expecting it. Which kind of surprise was it? Pleasant or otherwise?”
“I’m not sure.”
“Then I’ll try again.”
He bent his head and kissed her temple. Then her chin, her jaw, the place between her eyebrows.
His tongue flicked over her ear.
Slid down her neck.
Dipped into the warm, sensitive valley between her br**sts.