She didn't hear a snap. There was nothing to warn her. Her saddle just slid sideways and off—and she screamed as she went with it.
FORTY-SIX
CLUCKING HER tongue, Peggy placed a glass of water by Alexandra's bedside. "Whatever did you learn from old Lizzy that made you ride off so recklessly?"
"I don't wish to speak of it now. My head hurts."
"Hmmph." Peggy leaned to plump her pillows, which Tristan suspected only made Alexandra's pain worse. "Serves you right for going off without me there to watch out for you. If you ask me, you should go home until all these dangerous happenings cease. I vow and swear, if you ask me—"
"No one asked you," Tristan interrupted, rising from one of the striped chairs. He'd be vowing and swearing if he had to listen to her a single moment longer. "Leave us. Lady Hawkridge needs her rest."
"Well!" Peggy said and took herself out the door, closing it more forcefully than necessary.
Alexandra winced at the resulting bang. "You could be a bit kinder to her."
"Why in blazes do you put up with her?"
"She has her moods, but she's nice and helpful most of the time." She threw off her covers. "I'll have a talk—"
"Stay in bed!"
"I'm fine, Tris." As though to prove it, she sat up and swung her legs off the side. "A little bumped and bruised, is all—"
"You're not fine." He walked closer and slid his hands into her hair, probing gently. His fingers met a hard, raised lump. "No wonder your head hurts."
He'd nearly had a heart attack when Ernest rode up with Alexandra, scraped and bleeding, the two of them sharing the same horse with her mare tied behind. Thankfully, most of her wounds were superficial and had cleaned up rather nicely, but he cringed to see the remaining bruises.
Right now, he was grateful for Juliana's concealing nightgown, even if it was hideous.
He stepped back. "You took several years off my life. You're going to be the death of me, Alexandra, if you don't manage to kill yourself first. Or if I don't manage to kill you instead," he added in a disgusted mutter.
"Don't start that again. You were miles away when this happened."
"Leather straps don't simply split all by themselves. Someone must have cut partway through it sometime before you left." He paced over to the fireplace and leaned an elbow on the mantel, watching her. "Like me, last night, when I climbed out that window."
"Leather can weaken over time," she argued. "And you didn't climb out a window. The room felt overwarm in the night, so you got up, opened the window, and went back to bed." A thread of exasperation—or perhaps desperation—tinged her voice. "Must you make everything more complicated than it is?"
But it couldn't be as simple as she was claiming. This incident fit the pattern perfectly. The window had been wide open in the morning, and he had no memory of opening it. And, once again, his wife had been injured by an accident he'd had clear opportunity to arrange.
"Come sit by me," she said after an awkward moment of silence. She patted the mattress beside her.
He crossed the room and sat, but not too close.
He didn't feel worthy of touching her.
"You would never do anything to hurt me, Tris," she said quietly. "If I believe that, why can't you?"
Because his nights were voids in his memory. Because too many coincidences were impossible to ignore. Because someone else had died on a night when he knew he'd wandered.
He sighed. "This has to stop."
"I can't stop. That would mean dooming my sisters to dreary lives as spinsters and ourselves to an unhappy marriage."
"You must stop. Hastings came to me after you left, along with Mrs. Oliver and Vincent. They said they speak for the entire staff and are concerned that someone may be after you."
"They've all been accidents," she insisted stubbornly.
"What if they weren't accidents, Alexandra? Our own servants are worried for your safety. Have you any idea how frightened that made me while I waited for your return?" He was surprised he had any hair left, he'd run his hands through it so many times. "And then you rode up, all bruised and bloody—"
His voice broke, and he tried for a calming breath. Tried being the operative word.
But he had to calm down, because she was hurt. And seeing her hurt made him hurt in a way that Griffin's fists hadn't. He didn't want to yell at her.
He just wanted to make her understand.
He took a second breath, and then a third before he continued, as calmly as he knew how. "Someone could be after you in order to stop this investigation, or it could be me during my stressful, sleepwalking nights. Either way, you must cease."
"I won't," she said stubbornly.
It seemed she said everything stubbornly. He'd never met anyone quite as stubborn as Alexandra.
That made it very hard to maintain his newly acquired calm. "They're looking at Vincent," he said, the words coming out in a staccato cadence. "He's the only one who was new at the time, and his skin is darker than theirs, and they're looking at him."
"I'm sorry for that." She truly did look sorry. "Is he overwrought?"
He shook his head. "I'm overwrought."
"I'm sorry for that, too. But can't you see, Tris? If these three incidents were accidents, there's no reason for me to discontinue my efforts. And if they weren't accidents, that's even more reason for me to persevere. Because if someone is after me, that would mean your uncle was, in fact, murdered—and if there's a killer, that means we can find him and clear your name."
Tristan stared at her, mute, unable to believe his own ears. He was
