Page 23 of The Earl

“Why did you not return?”

The gentleness and concern in Roysa’s voice was the catalyst that finally sent the tears tumbling down her cheeks. The others didn’t hesitate—Sabine put her arm around her, Roysa knelt at her feet, Idalia huddled next to her.

She was surrounded by sympathy. Actually surrounded, and Cait had no choice. Her tears came quicker, sobs shaking her shoulders as a handkerchief was shoved into her hands. She covered her face with it, remembering.

Oh God, I am so very sorry, Conrad. Terric. Guy. Lance.

What they’d been forced to do.

For her.

“It was my fault.” Was that even her voice?

“Terric,” she managed. “And Rory. They were always around. Always so protective.”

Cait had caught the eye of the handsome earl’s son, and in a wild moment of thoughtlessness, she’d asked for Conrad to meet her, alone.

“I told him to meet me by the river. Behind the tents.”

She could see his face, less hardened than it was now but every bit as strong. “He refused, said it was not safe.”

What a silly girl she had been, thinking she was actually a woman. Her very first time away from Bradon Moor. What had she known?

Nothing.

“I pleaded, like a silly girl.” She opened her eyes. “Just one brief moment alone.” She made a sound. “I’d dreamt of a kiss, and got much more in the bargain.”

“No,” Roysa said, her voice firm. “This was not your fault, Cait. No.”

She ignored the words. “He said, ‘’Tis too dangerous,’ but I went anyway. By the time he realized it . . .”

When had her tears stopped?

“I wanted to tell the others. To tell my brother. So many times, I tried. Started to say the words, to apologize.”

“Listen to us.” Roysa grabbed her hand, sitting next to her. “You’ve naught to apologize for. What young woman would not want to steal a kiss from a man such as Conrad? Silly girl? Nay, you were all of us. Do not think that way any longer.”

The others nodded in agreement, and Cait was surprised to find herself smiling. A small smile but a genuine one.

“I stole a kiss from Lance well before it was proper. Each of us”—Idalia nodded to the others—“has a similar tale. Fortunately, none of us were accosted by a despicable man too drunk on his own self-importance and power to respect a young woman. ’Twas his fault, and he paid dearly for it. As befitted him.”

“I never told Terric,” she repeated.

“A fact that does not matter,” Roysa said. “It does not matter why you were out there that day. What happened brought them together.”

“They killed a man because of me.”

“A man,” Sabine said, squeezing her shoulders, “who tried to rape a young girl. Who attempted to kill four boys audacious enough to prevent him from committing the worst sort of injustice.”

Cait tried again. “But don’t you see? I never told him.” She turned to Roysa. “Terric. He does not know. I . . . I couldn’t . . .”

“He will not learn of it from me.” She raised her chin. “The men made a pact that day, and we will make her own.”

A chill ran through Cait, though not an entirely unpleasant one.

“All four of us will go to London. We will persevere against a corrupt king and return here, to Licheford, for a wedding.”

“All four? Roysa, you are mistaken.” The wedding was so outrageous a notion, she didn’t even feel the need to address it.