She stared at him, unsure if she had correctly followed what he said. “Papa said what?”
Paul nodded, his eyes misted with nostalgia. “He missed you something dreadful, child. Never was the same after you left. Walked around like one of his lungs was missing.”
She felt like she might float away. Like nothing held her to this earth.
She forced her face to remain in a semblance of a smile. “It is good to see you, Paul. Adam, if you are finished here, I must return home.”
She permitted Paul to give her one more hug—overly tight—and joined Adam in the horse cart. She stared straight ahead until they were out of sight of the workshop.
Adam smiled at her. “He thinks the world of you, Sera. He was so pleased when I mentioned you.”
“Why did you do that?” she hissed. “I asked you not to.”
He flinched, worrying the reins in his hands. “I thought I’d mention your name and see whether he seemed kind. And he did, so I told him you were here.”
She glared out at the tall hedgerows that lined the road, feeling trapped by them.
“You’re upset,” Adam said.
“Yes, I am upset.”
He bit his lip. “I would never deliberately put you in a difficult position,” he said softly. “I suppose I thought it odd that you spent an hour driving out to this place, to see a man you clearly have a high opinion of, just to sit outside. I thought maybe you lost your nerve.”
“Lost my nerve!” she exploded. “I broke a woman out of an asylum yesterday and defied her husband this morning without breaking a sweat. You think I’d cower before the village stone mason?”
“No, Sera. I know you are courageous. I just thought that it might be nice to see someone who welcomed you. An old friend. I’m sorry if I misjudged that.”
Dear God. This was why she did not try.
“I make my decisions, Adam. I do not need a man to make them for me out of his supposedly better judgment. Do not act against my wishes again.”
“Understood,” he said. “And I’m sorry.”
She sat silently, still seething. Her father’s face, contorted in rage, kept flashing through her mind.
“I can’t believe he said that,” she muttered. She didn’t really want to talk to Adam after his betrayal, but twisting the sentiment around in her head was causing her to feel like she might combust.
“Said what?” Adam asked.
“That my father thought I would return.”
How could he think she would believe herself welcome? And why had he never written? She was not hard to find.
“You didn’t think your pa might miss you?” Adam said softly.
She snorted. “Certainly not.”
And it was just as well she hadn’t known. If she had, she might have been tempted to forgive him out of sentimentality. And her opinions on sentimentality were no warmer than her opinions on regret.
Adam was staring off ahead at the dusty road. “I’m sure he did, Sera. Perhaps if you had a child, you’d think differently. It’s a tragic thing, to lose one.”
She went very, very still. “Yes.”
He glanced at her, and she contorted her mouth into a blank line so that he would not see how his words made her want to slap him, and said, “I suspect Mr. Bolitho exaggerates. My father could have found me easily, if he wanted to. He was alive when my book was published.”
Adam considered this. “Sometimes it’s hard to face people that you’ve hurt, even if you long to make amends. He might have been afraid. Or ashamed.”
Oh, poor dear man who cast his daughter out. What a pity. She smiled tightly. “One can avoid such difficulty by not hurting people in the first place.”
Adam frowned. “I’m so sorry that he hurt you.”
“Don’t be,” she snapped. This conversation was growing entirely too damp. “It made me what I am. Soft treatment makes soft people.”
It made her feel better to say that. It was true, and she would do well to remember it next time she lost her wits over a bunch of wildflowers.
He looked at her from the corner of his eye. “Is softness such a crime?”
She chose to treat the question as rhetorical. She did not answer questions that incriminated her.
They lapsed into an uncomfortable silence.
She began to feel badly for speaking harshly to Adam. It had been nice to see Paul Bolitho, she supposed. Adam had meant to be kind.
But she could not admit that now.
“This heat is unbearable,” she said, offering him the comment like a token of peace.
Adam wiped his own brow. “’Tis muggy indeed. Unpleasant weather here in Cornwall.”
“Like the people,” she muttered.
He laughed at this harder than the quip deserved, like he was eager to restore their previous good humor. “Shall we stop somewhere for lemonade?” he asked.
“You know, there used to be a woman who sold ices on Golowan day at the market. I wonder if she is still there. Turn here, by the square.”
The town was full of people buying festive foods and making preparations. She spotted several people she remembered—the vicar and the butcher and Abby Halliwell, who had married Tom Maben. She pulled her hat down over her eyes, lest she be recognized, but no one paid her any mind.
The woman with the ices stood in front of the post office, exactly where she’d always been. Sera hopped down, leaving Adam with the horses, and walked across the street to buy two sweets. She licked the edge of hers quickly so it wouldn’t melt, walking briskly back to deliver Adam’s to him before it was a puddle in her hand. In her rush, she stumbled on a loose paving stone and her hat came off her head.
She knelt on the paving stones to pick it up, juggling the ices in one hand.
When she stood up, Baron Trewlnany was staring at her from across the square, his face contorted in disgust.
Seraphina looked like she might faint.
Adam followed her gaze to see what had alarmed her. She was looking at a handsome, well-dressed man with auburn hair who stood regarding her with a dark expression on his face. He was flanked by a group of ginger-headed children.
The littlest child pulled his arm, and this seemed to break him from his trance. He turned to his family and ushered them away into a waiting carriage.
The woman Sera had greeted at the inn came walking out of the haberdasher with a package and climbed into the carriage after them.
Seraphina remained fixed where she stood, watching the carriage drive away as nectar from the melting ices dripped down her fingers. Her face was like a dead woman’s.
“Sera?” he called, walking toward her.
She started, as if she had forgotten he was waiting.
Slowly, she made plodding steps back to the cart. He took the ices so she could climb up. She did so without a word.
“What’s wrong?” he asked.
“Nothing,” she said absently.
“You look like you’ve seen a ghost.”
“Just old friends,” she said faintly. “People I haven’t thought of in some time.”
She did not eat her ice. She held it out over the edge of the buggy as they drove and let it fly out of her hand. Her distress was so obvious that he could not in good conscience eat sweets, and he threw his out, too.