Forbidden by Susan Johnson (best feel good books txt) 📗

on with a grin, moving closer so his voice was clearer. "Daisy'll be safe there until this blows over. Ride back with us in our carriage. You're going to get soaked otherwise."

Etienne gauged the distance to the lighthouse, visible on a spit of land beyond an undulating series of dunes and stunted pines. "I'll see her home when this blows over. If you don't mind."

The men's voices were raised, their dark hair whipped by the wind, their eyes half-shut against the blowing sand. "Whether I mind isn't a factor with Daisy," Trey shouted, his smile amiable. "Be my guest."

The Duc smiled back. "Thank you," he said, but his words were taken away by a gust of rain.

Sweeping sheets of rain struck Etienne before he was halfway to the lighthouse, his horse slowed by the gale-force winds. He'd changed at Nadine's after his morning with Hector so at least his leather jacket protected him from the worst of the downpour. But his clothes were thoroughly drenched by the time he entered the lighthouse after tethering his horse in the lee of the building.

"Afternoon," the lighthouse keeper casually said when Etienne scaled the steep narrow steps to the top, the old man's seventy-years experience with Atlantic storms evident in his unruffled serenity. "You get a good view of the storm front from up here. Nice animal you're riding."

The Duc was mounted on a bay, bred at his Chantilly stud, a long-legged thoroughbred with enough Irish hunter in him to have the staying power he needed for polo. "Thanks," he briefly acknowledged, not here for a chat, his glance swiftly taking in the small dimensions of the tower room. "I'm looking for a woman who was painting on the shoreline this afternoon. Is she here?" Had he somehow missed Daisy downstairs?

"Nope." The old man rocked his cushioned chair in a slow rhythm, his old spaniel lying at his feet, keeping time with his feathered tail. "Saw her over to the old Hammerhead farm earlier. Figured she picked up and left when the clouds started rolling in."

"Were's the farm?" The Duc's voice was quiet, but the spaniel must have caught his anxious intonation because it lifted its head and stared at Etienne.

"Just past that rise over there." The lighthouse keeper lifted his chin in a northerly direction, indicating the area beyond the curve of the bay. "Where them three pines are leaning almost to the ground."

"Is there shelter?"

"Nope. Everything burned to the ground thirty years ago. Excepting the well-house and that would have gone too but the artesian well kept is moss-damp so it wouldn't burn. Fire killed old widow Hammerhead in her bed though," he went on, relating the details in the slightly nasal inflection of the local populace. "Smoke must have got her or mayhap a heart attack considerin' the state of her heart. She was too fat to move fast too, so—"

"Daisy might be there then," Etienne interrupted, already turning toward the narrow staircase.

"Told you she left."

"She never returned to the carriages." Etienne's voice echoed up the stuccoed walls of the stairwell as he sprinted downward.

"You want me to send Boscoe here for help?" The man's voice followed Etienne's descent. "Can't leave the station during a storm but Boscoe will bring back Will Shatterly."

"No," the Duc shouted back. "I'll find her myself." He wanted to be alone when he found her.

Etienne's horse struggled gamely over the saturated terrain, its hoofs sinking deep into the marshy ground or water-soaked sand of the dunes. At least the wind was slicing into them at an angle now, easing the strain of having to fight the full force of its velocity. Etienne's eyes were almost shut against the driving rain, his horse's ears laid back as it strained its powerful muscles to maintain its balance in the yielding soil.

When they crested the rise some twenty minutes later, what remained of the old farmstead came into sight. An ancient apple orchard lay to the south of what appeared to be the foundations of the house; the ruins of a barn, distinguishable by the charred remains of a few roof timbers not completely burned, lay to the north. If there had been smaller outbuildings, after thirty years no evidence of them remained. But a large stand of orange day-lilies caught his eye against the storm-gray of the sky and when theDuc turned to focus on the splash of color in the landscape laid waste by fire and time, he saw the well-house.

The tiny weathered building had been constructed at the base of another small knoll, so the wind broke over it before dissipating into the grassy dunes. A gnarled lilac bush spread halfway across the doorway, its leafy branches lashing furiously against the soaked wood.

He saw no sign of life as he approached. No window on the structure. No indication Daisy had been in the vicinity.

Dismounting, Etienne tied his horse behind the well-house, and fighting the wind, moved around to the door. When he caught sight of the freshly crushed grasses on the threshold, he involuntarily sucked in a breath. Was she here? Exhaling, he conditioned himself against the possibility of an untenanted building. But his gaze took in the evidence of footsteps, and quickly shoving the door open, he bent his head to enter the low portal.

Silhouetted against the silvery sky, his broad leather-clad shoulders filled the entrance like some apparition of the storm itself: potent and powerful and overwhelming. Pausing for a moment on the threshold between light and darkness, he turned his body slightly to ease his wide shoulders past the jamb. Once inside, he stood upright and shook his wet head like a wild animal might to clear the water from his face.

"Etienne!" It was Daisy's breathless voice.

Narrowing his eyes against the deep shadow beyond the door, he distinguished her form—only dimly visible pressed against the far wall. She was standing very straight… and trembling. Taking a moment to visualize her position in relation to the entrance and the bubbling well