“A right nasty headache,” he replied, fingering the hideous knob and dark bruise
“It is a jolly good thing you have an exceptionally hard head.”
“No doubt.” Freddie strode forward to gaze down at his dead horse, the blood, dark on his red satin hide. “My poor fellow,” he murmured. “Whoever did this to you will pay, I promise you that.”
Thea gazed up at the peak above them. “I will bet you whoever shot at you was up there.”
“I will not take that wager.”
He strode to the roan mare and picked up her reins. “I will help you mount.”
“I would rather not ride, Freddie,” she said, feeling too sore to climb back up into that wretched saddle.
“And I would rather you not walk,” he told her. “You know you have to get back on after a spill or you will never ride again.”
With a deeply fetched sigh of resignation, Thea permitted him to help her mount and raised no protest when he took the reins and led the placid mare toward home. Gazing down at the back of his dark head, she asked, “Who might want to kill you, Freddie?”
He glanced back over his shoulder. “No one. I am starting to suspect it was an accident, Thea.”
“An accident? Are you mad?”
“Not yet.”
Fuming, growing angry, she snapped, “Just how can you explain this as an accident?”
“Someone was out hunting,” he replied, his tone neutral. “Perhaps he fired at a fox up there, missed and hit my horse.”
“Certainly,” she said, caustic. “Mistook a red horse for a red fox. Something anyone can do, it happens all the time.”
“No need to be nasty.”
“Then why did this hunter not come to our aid? Where is he now?”
Freddie tossed a faint grin over his shoulder. “If you nearly killed the Viscount of Willowdale, would you want to admit that to his face? Risk being placed in gaol or hung?”
Thea wanted to hit something. “I suppose not. But youmustconsider the possibility that this shooting was intentional, that someone just tried to kill you.”
“Why should I think that?
“That way you are on your guard should he want to try again.”
Silent for long moments, Freddie nodded at last. “You are quite right, Thea. I will take precautions, even though I think this was simply an accident.”
Thea breathed in deeply. “Thank you. I do not want to lose you.”
Again, his teeth flashed in a quick grin. “I do not want you to lose me.”
“Only you would find this situation humorous.”
Freddie shrugged. “I am alive, you are alive. I am just trying to make the best of all this.”
“I know.”
It took them nearly an hour to traverse the distance back to the Willowdale estate house. By that time, Thea’s scrapes and soreness had increased even as stiffness settled into her badly jolted muscles. “How are you doing?” she asked as the huge white house came into view past a bend in the road.
“Hurting pretty good now,” Freddie admitted. “I need a few stiff whiskeys in me, I do believe.”
“I think I will join you.”
