Molly gave her a very small smile. “Can we play a game, Edith? We’re almost at the village, and there are all sorts of hiding places. I can hide, and you find me.”
“It sounds lovely.” Edith got to her feet and helped her up, giving her a serious look. “Stay close, though. I’m not going to explain to your uncle how I lost you in a game.”
Molly agreed and took her hand, skipping alongside Edith as they moved further away from Merrifield down the worn grass path.
Edith smiled when Molly disengaged and began to twirl in the open space. There was something so vibrant about her, so full of life, and it was contagious. She was the sweetest girl, and clever beyond her years.
“I’ll hide first!” Molly cried, suddenly dashing towards the abandoned blacksmith’s shed.
Edith obediently turned her back, smirking to herself. “I’ll count to thirty, lass, and then I’ll be coming to get ye!”
“If you can find me!” came the laughing reply.
Commencing with her counting, Edith looked up into the cloud-dotted sky, smiling at the beautiful day. After the exquisite experience of the ball, dancing with Graham enough times to draw comment, sitting next to each other at dinner, brushing fingers and legs against each other, sleep was near impossible to come by. Dreams could not be better than the reality she had experienced.
Graham had spirited her away before the final dance of the evening, kissing her sweetly in the corridor, and holding her close. “We’re on the brink of something, Edith, if only we can catch it.”
Another long, slow kiss had finished the conversation, and they had danced together one final time.
She hadn’t seen him yet this morning, but Molly had told her they had breakfasted together, which made Edith smile.
He was so good to his niece. So good to all of them.
“Thirty!” Edith called out, turning around to face the shed.
She came closer, keeping her tread light, looking around the back of the building for possible alternative hiding places and finding none.
Molly was near the shed somewhere, if only Edith could find her.
There were only so many places she could be, considering the state of the place, and after only a few moments of looking, Edith surmised that the girl had come to the far side of the building, likely crouching in a cupboard on that side, or some such. Edith pressed her back to the building, grinning to herself. She would silently count to ten, then leap out with a cry that would startle Molly, whether she was inside a cupboard or not.
Feeling more like a child than she had in years, Edith grinned in breathless anticipation, then sprang around the corner with a roar and a grin.
It faded in a heartbeat.
Molly stood not far off, beside Sir Reginald, two large men standing by, restraining her. The men had their hands on the butts of guns, and one had a hand over Molly’s mouth. Her eyes were wide with terror, sending jolts of fear into Edith’s stomach, the urge to be sick clenching at her.
“Lady Edith,” Sir Reginald said with a smirk, his voice so sneering it made her skin crawl.
He looked her over very thoroughly, his eyes lingering in obvious places, and anyone alive would have felt filthy by the time he was done.
“What are you doing?” Edith hissed, clenching her fists. “Let her go.”
He clucked his tongue and shook his head, reaching out to touch the girl’s hair. “Not a chance.”
Molly struggled fiercely, and the men holding her clamped on harder. There was something menacing about the look in their eyes, in their manner, and there was obvious impatience with her. She was entirely expendable to all three of them.
“Dinnae struggle,” Edith told her firmly, trying her utmost to remain calm for her sake. “Dinnae fight them. Be still.”
She looked at Edith, her eyes filling with tears, but she nodded and went still.
“Playing with village children, Lady Edith?” Sir Reginald clicked his tongue in disapproval, shaking his head. “And during a house party? That is not very polite of you. How disrespectful to Lord Radcliffe, after all he has done for you.” He touched Molly’s hair again, smiling at her.
“Don’t touch her!” Edith spat, coming closer.
He gave her a hard look. “Do you think I have any interest in this child?” he replied, losing his false congeniality. “I could not care less. I only took her to convince you of the gravity of your situation.”
“My situation?” she asked, feeling her body grow cold at the look in his eyes.
He nodded once. “It is very simple. It has always been very simple, but you have chosen to complicate matters. You come with me back to London now, and this child is free to return to her village and parents.”
Realization dawned on Edith, rippling across her frozen skin with some measure of comfort.
Sir Reginald had no idea whose child he had taken, or of her identity at all. If he had, he would not have been so willing to part with her. Had he known who her family was, he would have devised a far more cunning plan.
And that, Edith could not have borne.
“What will you do with me?” she asked, unable to look at Molly, her mind reeling in an attempt to form some sort of plan.
The look in his eyes was so lewd it brought bile rising to Edith’s mouth. “That list is not suitable for a child’s ears, my dear.”
She shuddered and put a hand to her mouth, closing her eyes, forcing herself to breathe.
Every threat, every touch, every image he had painted in her mind suddenly revisited her en masse, causing her to sway almost unsteadily. How could she submit to him? How?
How could she not, with what was at stake?
“Come, come, Lady Edith, we haven’t all day.”
She opened her eyes and looked back at him in disgust. “You swear to me that she will be free? No repercussions?”
He nodded. “None, unless you raise an alarm about this. She is free to go as free as she came. But if you scream, if you alert anyone to what you are about, we will come back for her.”
Molly whimpered, and the sound reverberated in Edith’s soul. She looked at her for a long moment, knowing what she was going to do, but utterly loathe to submit to his will. “May I have time to pack my things and say my farewells?” she asked him, her attention still on Molly.
Sir Reginald snorted in derision. “And have you leave word for Lord Radcliffe to hunt you down? I think not. I’d rather let him stew in wondering where you went, assuming he cares, and your dear, devoted friends thinking the worst. No, your things can be sent for. We leave right this moment or not at all.”
Edith closed her eyes again and took a moment to breathe again.
To have one final moment of peace. To resign herself to her fate.
Then she met his cold, sneering eyes again. “Very well,” she said clearly, without any hint of her natural brogue. “I consent.”
Molly cried out behind her captors’ hands.
“Hush!” Sir Reginald snapped as he turned to her. “I’ve had quite enough of you.”
“Sir Reginald!” Edith said immediately, throwing as much firmness and coldness into her tone as she could, taking two steps forward.
He and his men looked at her in surprise.
“Leave that child alone,” she ground out, her jaw tight. “I have agreed to your terms, now let her go. I willna condone you treating her thus.”