Chapter 1
Staffordshire, England, 1814
Mia Featherstone had never been afraid of a man until she met Allan Davies. How foolish could she have been to trust a man like him. She’d barely known him. While attractive with his dark brown hair, blue eyes, and cultured manners, she now knew he held an evil inside him that none of her herbs could heal.
“Tell me where you hid it,” Allan demanded.
Mia attempted to stand her ground but as his hand lifted higher, fear caused her legs to tremble. “I won’t tell you,” she whispered.
The force of his blow to her cheek knocked her back four steps. Even as she stumbled, she couldn’t understand why this was so important to him. She caught herself on the table. Her fright grew into panic. He had only hit her once before today and then had apologized profusely for hurting her. Something had happened to enrage him to the point that it didn’t matter if someone discovered what he’d done to her.
“You will tell me.” He stalked her menacingly. “You will never leave until you do. And no one knows about us so this is the last place anyone would look for you.”
Mia glanced about the small cottage, desperate for a path of escape. She only had to run a short distance to be back on the earl’s land. Allan would never dare set foot on Hart’s lands. For some reason unknown to her, he feared the earl. But how would she outrun him? She’d been a fool to meet him at the cottage. The last time they’d been together, she’d sensed a change in him. She had put that off, believing him when he told her he was just tired from working.
Although to this day, she had no idea what he did to earn a living.
“Where is the treasure?” he demanded again.
“It was no treasure,” she said softly. “The little bit of gold I found, I gave to the tenants. There is nothing left.”
He stepped closer until his hot breath seared her cheek. “Do you think I’m a fool?”
Before she could answer, his fist landed on her belly. Mia doubled over, attempting to draw a breath into her lungs. Pain washed over her entire body. “Wh—Why is this so important to you?” she managed to say.
“That is none of your concern.” As he moved to hit her again, she turned her head slightly to dodge the blow. Instead, his fist landed squarely on her eye.
“Ahh,” she screamed. She slid to the floor and fought the desire to lose consciousness from the pain coursing through her. Giving in to the darkness would mean letting him win. As she curled into a ball to protect her body, he kicked her in the ribs. For a thin man, he packed a terrifying punch.
“If you won’t tell me where you hid your treasure then at least tell me where you found it. There has to be more.”
Mia had no idea if there were any more pieces of gold or not. The last time she dug, she’d found nothing. “On the earl’s land,” she choked out.
“Dammit!” Allan picked up a glass from the table and hurled it across the room. He yanked her up to her feet.
She clung to him afraid if he released her she would fall to the floor again. “Allan, please let me go.”
“Not yet.” He studied her carefully. “Where on the earl’s land?”
“I don’t remember,” she lied. “I was helping one of the tenants plant potatoes.”
He slapped her again. “I want the truth this time.”
She couldn’t tell him the truth. He would get her banished from the earl’s land if Hart ever discovered what she’d done. “I don’t remember. It was last year.”
He shoved her so hard she hit her head against the wall. Tears blinded her. How could she have ever thought Allan was a respectable man? A man worthy of her regard. A man worthy of her body.
This time when she fell to the floor, her hand hit something cold and metallic. She forced the tears from her eyes and noticed the knife on the floor next to her. She slid it under the folds of her skirt.
“Get up,” he said and then gulped down a glass of gin. “We can stay here all day. But you aren’t leaving until you tell me exactly where you discovered the gold.”
“It was only a few pieces, Allan.” Mia struggled to keep the knife hidden as she rose on shaking legs. “I only found a sword hilt and a coin.” She could never tell him how much she’d actually found. The tenants needed the money far more than he did.
“There has to be more.” Desperation lined his voice. “I’ve watched you. You have been giving the tenants more than the price of a hilt and buckle.”
“They were solid gold, Allan. It was a bloody fortune but there is no more. The most likely explanation is one of the earl’s relatives was practicing his swordplay and lost the hilt of his sword several hundred years ago.”
He poured another glass of gin and swallowed it back. “No. There is more and you are going to find it for me.”
Mia blinked as the room started to spin. She couldn’t lose consciousness now. Her escape was possible. She stood between him and the door. She had a knife. Nausea roiled in her belly and the rotating room became dizzying. If she didn’t act now, she might be here all night.
“No.” She lifted her right hand with the knife in it. “I am leaving now and you will not follow me.”
Allan let out a great coarse laugh. “Mia, do you really think you could hurt me with that?”
“Yes, I really do.” There were a great many things Allan didn’t know about her, and she would use that to her advantage, if the room would just stop spinning. “My father taught me to throw knives to protect myself,” she lied. After all, how would he know if that was true?
Well, how hard could it be? Aim, throw.
He took a step toward her with his hand held out. “Give me the knife, Mia.”
“Very well.” She lifted her arm and then flung the knife at him.
“You fucking bitch!” he screamed as the knife reached its target.
Without looking to see where she’d hit him, she raced from the house. She had to run until she reached the earl’s lands and the safety of her home. She squashed the nausea threatening to stop her. She could hear him stumbling out of the cottage, giving chase.
“I’m coming for you, Mia,” he yelled as he tracked her. “If you think a little knife will