Being with her was like being home.
“You’ve come back to me.” She sighed with contentment before closing her eyes. “How I’ve missed your smile, missed your touch.”
The muscles in his abdomen twisted with longing, with regret. “Sophia, wake up.” Cursed saints! This woman was a skilled tormentor. “Jessica has left the house. We need to find her. Sophia!”
She woke again with a start. “What?” She shot to a sitting position, though it took her a moment to gather her wits.
“Jessica has wandered out into the woods. I can go alone if you would rather wait here.”
“No!” Sophia yanked back the coat she’d been using as a blanket and swung her legs out of bed. “Quick. We need Blent to fetch the hounds.”
“I’ve sent Dr Goodwin to alert him. Where are your boots?” He didn’t wait for a reply but found them near the night table. Without thought, he dropped to his knees, captured each ankle in turn and helped her slip into her footwear.
Sophia studied him intently as he tied the laces and drew her to her feet. “I thought we weren’t supposed to touch one another,” she said, moving to snatch her thick woollen cloak from the chair. She fastened it around her shoulders with haste. “You’ve kept to that rule for years, and yet you’ve broken it a handful of times today.”
“It’s impossible to work together and not have some physical contact.”
It was why he’d initially refused to take the case. And yet he couldn’t lie. He welcomed the deep awareness coursing through his veins whenever Sophia was close. He welcomed the connection that banished the loneliness temporarily.
“Come,” he said, shrugging into his greatcoat. “We should follow the path to the deadwood. According to Blent, it’s Jessica’s preferred destination.”
Finlay escorted Sophia out of the house. She came to an abrupt halt in the porch, her frantic gaze scanning the tiled floor. “Where’s the lantern? We leave a lantern and a tinderbox here every night.”
Finlay shrugged. “Dr Goodwin must have taken it. It’s only a five-minute walk if we cross the bridge over the moat and follow the path down to the road.” He glanced at her bare hands. “It’s cold tonight. Where are your gloves?”
“I’ve left them upstairs. No matter. Come, we must hurry.”
Sophia raised her skirts and rushed towards the gatehouse.
As they crossed the bridge and hastened along the weed-infested drive, he couldn’t help but draw comparisons to the night he’d spent searching for Hannah in Rectory Wood. Echoes of the past seemed to find their way into the present. Perhaps it was the Lord’s way of forcing a man to face his fears. To own his mistakes.
“Tomorrow morning we need to interview the servants,” he said, slowing to enable Sophia to keep pace. He revealed what Anne had told him about the door to the servants’ staircase. “One of them assisted Jessica in her escape.”
“Why would they encourage her to come to the woods? It makes no sense.”
“Why would a woman who’s desperate to keep the demons from her door leave the house in the dead of night?” That made no sense, either. But those with a disordered mind behaved irrationally. And he suspected the excessive doses of medicine accounted for Jessica’s sleepwalking and bouts of delirium.
At the end of the drive, the wrought-iron gates were locked, fastened with a heavy chain. The entrance to Newgate wasn’t as secure. Sophia approached the small sandstone building to the left. She reached up into the low portico, ran her fingers along the white wooden ledge and found a key. After slipping briefly into the gatekeeper’s lodge, she returned with an iron key.
“This way.” She drew him to the wooden door in the boundary wall.
They exited onto the main road, a coaching route that began at Hyde Park Corner and stretched to Land’s End. In bygone times, it was a road frequented by highwaymen. Indeed, it was the road where D’Angelo witnessed the murder of his parents when he was but a boy.
The narrow path through the woods started at a rickety stile. Finlay climbed over first before helping Sophia navigate the unstable structure. He had no choice but to settle his hands on her waist and lower her down to the ground. For a few seconds, their bodies were but inches apart, their misty white breath mingling, making love in the gloom.
“Thank you.” She placed a steadying hand on his chest, covering his heart.
Her pale skin looked translucent beneath the faint sheen of moonlight. The sight of her parted lips, moist and full of promise, tugged at his core. Were they not hunting for Jessica, he feared his traitorous body might betray him.
“We should hurry,” she said in a tone full of uncertainty, an echo of his internal struggle. “You must take my hand, Finlay. This way is less trodden. The exposed roots are a danger in the dark.”
His reluctance to touch her waned by the day, the hour, the minute. Besides, what choice did he have but to capture her hand and lead her onto the overgrown path? Though the intimate action warmed his soul, the ancient wood wielded an incomprehensible power. As their boots squelched in the sodden earth and the trees loomed large, he was overcome by a sudden morbidness.
Perhaps his mood reflected the horror of that day in the Sonian Forest—these woods felt like enemy territory, too. Perhaps his mood reflected the horror of the night he’d argued with Hannah and she’d raced into Rectory Wood
during a heavy downpour. Like Jessica, she often went missing, rarely remembered where she had been, didn’t care if she caught a chill.
“Hannah!” The involuntary call left his lips, a cry in the darkness.