spacing of her footsteps, he could tell that she was running. But as he sprinted after her, he surmised that she was getting tired, a fact that was confirmed when the spacing of her footprints showed that she’d finally started walking.
Within a minute, he saw her in the distance, struggling to reach the top of a dune. He didn’t say anything, didn’t want to alert her yet that he was close on her heels. Once she disappeared over the other side behind a tall clump of yellowing grass, he picked up his pace.
By the time he reached the dune, his lungs burned from his effort. When he crested the hill, he stopped short at the sight of her crumpled in a heap at the bottom. His heart skidded up into his throat. Had she fallen?
“Victoria!” He slid down the sandy embankment and fell to his knees next to her, attempting to assess her condition. “Are you hurt?”
Her face was buried in her hands, and soft sobs echoed in the hollow.
He lifted his hand to her shoulder but hesitated to touch her. He didn’t want to frighten her any more than she already was. But the shuddering of her body and the brokenness of her sobs reached inside and ripped at him. He lowered his fingers to her back tentatively. At his touch, she leaned toward him.
He released his breath and gathered her into his arms. She came willingly, and he lifted his eyes heavenward with a grateful whisper of a prayer. She was afraid. But not of him.
“I’m sorry,” she said against his coat. “I’m so sorry.”
He hugged her closer and kissed the top of her head, which was covered with a sheer veil. For a moment, he held her, attempting to catch his breath and steady the frantic pace of his heartbeat.
When her shaking diminished to an occasional quaver, he finally spoke. “What are you afraid of, Victoria?”
“I don’t know.” Her voice was sad and muffled against him.
He brushed a hand gently down her arm. She sighed and snuggled into him. She might not know what she was running from, but he knew what he’d been avoiding all these years. How could he expect her to stop and face her fears if he wasn’t willing to do the same?
“You asked me to tell you about Ike,” he said quietly.
She sat up and looked at him, her long lashes wet with tears.
His jaw clenched, but he forced the words out anyway. “It’s my fault he died.”
She didn’t say anything. She reached for his fingers that he hadn’t realized he’d bunched into a fist. She gently pried them open and laced her fingers with his.
He didn’t want to talk about this. But he swallowed the resistance that formed in his throat, and then he plunged back in the pit of hell where he hadn’t wanted to return. To the frosty dark night with the mist falling and the stench of death all around. “The night Mom came after Ike and me, she cut me free from my bindings and started to work on Ike’s. But he stopped her and told her to take me out of the camp before it was too late.”
From their spot in the back of the wagon with all of the corpses awaiting burial, he’d been able to see the guard who’d been assigned to the night watch squatting two dozen feet away in the woods relieving himself. He supposed the guard had assumed that since Tom and Ike were bound and weakened, they wouldn’t be able to go anywhere, and so the guard had taken his time.
“I told Ike I wouldn’t leave without him. But he pushed me away. Told Mom to take me.” Tom shuddered and felt Victoria stroke his arm.
“You don’t have to tell me any more if you don’t want to,” she said.
Now that he’d started, he couldn’t stop. “I told Ike that I’d carry him. But when I slid out of the wagon, I couldn’t hold myself up without Mom’s help. That didn’t stop me from turning back to Ike and trying to free him.” He closed his eyes as the nightmare repeated itself. “Ike told me to go. Mom tried to pull me away. But I was stubborn, and I kept sawing away at the rope around his hands. When those were free, I started trying to free his legs.”
Thankfully, the wind and the rattling branches overhead had muted their whispered conversation and kept the guard from hearing them. Even so,