Page 55 of The Heart of an Earl

His gaze tore away from the foyer and he looked at her. “My sweet Julianna.” His hands lifted and he clasped her face between his palms. “My sweet, sweet Julianna.”

She grabbed his wrists, her voice hard. “I need Mother, Father.”

His head shook slightly and he looked around the drawing room as if surprised his wife wasn’t in the chamber. “Of course.” His hands dropped from her face. “Of course. I’ll get her.”

He moved around Jules, leaving her standing in the middle of the drawing room.

Mr. Charles still sat on the settee, though he looked much farther away from death than he had when they had first brought him in there. He looked at Jules, shaking his head, his voice weary. “Much has changed, Lady Julianna.”

She glanced over her shoulder at the open doors to the foyer where her father had disappeared. “And much has stayed the same.”

“That it has.” Unmistakable sadness ached in his voice.

Just as she started to look back to Mr. Charles, she caught sight of Des moving past the drawing room window. He was probably going to the stables to retrieve his horse.

She had to stop him from leaving.

Her mother would fix everything. She would listen to Jules and welcome Des into their home.

“I—I will be back, Mr. Charles. Please excuse me for a moment.” She spun and went to the foyer, looking both up the stairs and down the hallway that led to the library and her father’s study. Both were empty. She ran down the hall on her tiptoes and slipped out the side door just past her father’s study.

“Des.” She intercepted him just before he reached the side entrance, the cold sleet that she’d stepped out into bitter pins on her face.

Des pulled himself to a stop, his voice a low whisper. “Jules—thank the heavens. We have to leave—leave here now.”

“No, you have to stay. Mother will come down and fix everything.” She grabbed his forearms. “I am so sorry—I forgot—time passed and I forgot how my father could be. What he could do. His anger. Time happened and I only remembered the good in him. But there is so much…”

Her voice trailed off, her look dropping to the snow-covered ground on his left.

“Bad? I saw it in his face, Jules. The murder in his eyes. He means to kill me for daring to touch you.”

“Des—no.”

His look cut into her. “I’ve been in enough battles to know when someone is about to kill me—and this is a battle I had no way to foresee.”

She shook her head. “No…”

“Yes, Jules.” His fingers lifted to grip onto her elbows. “We have to leave and we have to leave now.”

“No, no, no—this was supposed to be different—not like this.” Her hands dropped from his forearms and she rubbed her palms on her face, her eyes closed. The spikes of the icy sleet dug crevices into her skin. “I know you’re right. Bloody Judas—what have I done?” Her eyes opened to him. “What have I done, coming back here? Bringing you?”

His voice dipped low. “You’ve done exactly what you should have, Jules—but now we have to leave.”

She nodded. “You’re right. Maybe in a day or a week we can return when he’s calmed. I can write mother and explain everything—who you are, how I made it back.” Jules grabbed his hand as she turned, pulling him into motion. They moved along the building and rounded the back corner of Gatlong Hall when Jules jerked to a stop, yanking back on Des’s hand.

Two of the footmen that had thrown Des out the front door were entering the stables.

Her head shaking, she backed up, dragging him with her. “They don’t mean to let you leave—not peacefully.” Her grip on his hand went brutal as she wiped sleet from her eyelashes. “Damn my father—damn his vile temper—his idiocy.”

Des tugged her along the stone side of the hall, his head swiveling, searching in all directions. “They’re in the stables so we need to escape on foot—which is the best way? One that will get us to the closest village?”

She pointed to the forest that spread out far and long on the opposite side of the rambling drive up to Gatlong Hall. “There—to Snowshill.”

“Then we run. We need to get to the woods before the footmen come out of the stable.”

They darted in a sprint across the open expanse of land between the house and the forest, Jules praying with every slick step in the snow that no one would see them escaping into the confines of the trees.

Des only slowed his gait once they were well into the woods, dodging the shrubbery and trunks, his grip pulling her along faster than she would have been able to run on her own.

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