A Stranger at Castonbury. Amanda McCabe
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pushed the papers he was looking at back into their case as she stopped beside the table.
‘Where are you going?’ she asked. ‘Somewhere dangerous?’ She felt foolish even as she said the words. Of course he was going someplace dangerous—that was their lives in Spain now, and a man like Jamie, an English officer, was always at the very heart of it.
Yet she had a strange feeling there was more to this than the usual marching and shooting, more than the danger they faced every day. Her glance flickered to the hidden papers. ‘You are leaving the regiment?’
‘For a time.’ Jamie ran his hands over his face again, and Catalina had the sense that he wrestled with something deep inside, something he couldn’t or wouldn’t share with her. Somewhere she couldn’t yet follow.
She knelt beside him and took his hands tightly in hers. She could feel the scrapes and calluses of his hands, the warmth of his skin against hers. ‘I am your wife now,’ she said quietly. ‘You can share anything with me, Jamie, and it will be safe. I will follow you anywhere.’
‘Oh, Catalina.’ He smiled down at her, but she could still see that shadow in his eyes. He turned his hand in hers and raised her fingers to his lips for a lingering, tender kiss. ‘There are places where I would never let you follow me.’
Catalina curled her fingertips lightly around his cheek. His evening growth of dark beard tickled her palm and she smiled. ‘How would you stop me?’
Jamie smiled wryly against her hand. ‘I couldn’t, of course. No one is braver or more stubborn than you.’
‘Except for you?’
‘I can be stubborn indeed when it comes to keeping you safe.’ He held out her hand balanced on his and studied the way her fingers twined with his. ‘Would you not consider going to my family in England?’
Catalina fell back on her heels, so surprised by his words that she didn’t know what to say. ‘England? But … I have never been there. Your family wouldn’t know me.’ She would be a foreigner in an English home centuries old. Yes, she had found it within herself to leave her home and come here to be a nurse—but at least she knew Spain, knew the people. In England would she not be alone?
‘They would come to know you—and you would be safe there until I could join you.’
If he could join her there. The unspoken words hung heavy between them, and Catalina felt a bolt of pure fear. She had known Jamie would have to go at some time, that everything that was happening around them would part them. But not yet. Please God, not yet.
She pulled herself to her feet and sat down heavily on the other stool. Her hands fell from Jamie’s, and he leaned closer to her, his forearms braced on his knees. ‘What is happening, Jamie?’ she said. ‘What is in those papers?’
‘I’ve been requested to take on a secret assignment,’ Jamie said quietly.
‘Secret?’ Catalina said, confused. ‘What does that mean?’
‘I have done such tasks before, when a certain degree of … discretion is required. It turns out I am unfortunately rather good at subterfuge.’
‘What have they asked you to do this time?’
Jamie silently reached for the papers. ‘You must understand, I have told no one else about this. Utter secrecy is necessary. But you should know.’
Catalina nodded. He handed her the documents and she quickly scanned them. As she read, a growing sense of disbelief and dismay crept over her. ‘It—it looks as if you are to work for King Ferdinand.’
‘Not for him. For the English forces who see it as being in their best interests for him to return to the throne.’
‘And you are merely their pawn? You, a marquis?’
‘It is not quite like that.’ He took the papers gently from her numb hands and locked them back in the box. ‘I have done such things before when the need arose. But it is different now.’
‘Different how?’ Catalina demanded, still so confused and angry. Jamie was her husband now, but did she really know him so little? Was her husband only a figure of her imagining, and was a cold English nobleman the truth?
No—she could not believe that of Jamie. Never. But why would he undertake such a task?
‘Different because of you. Because of all you have told me, about your family and your brother.’ He reached for her hand and she let him take it. ‘Because I know I must be more careful now.’
Catalina shook her head, biting back a sob. ‘Yes, you do have to be more careful, for so many reasons. I know how terrible war is, how so much can change so quickly—but I do not want to lose you.’ Not now, when she felt as if she was first coming to know him. Not now, when she had to make him see things from her point of view.
But how would they make it all work after the war was over, and they had to find a normal way of life together?
‘I never want to lose you either.’ He raised her hand to his lips and kissed her fingers. ‘I couldn’t bear it, not now that I have just found you.’
‘So you will not take this task?’
He didn’t answer. Instead he stood and drew her up into his arms. He pulled her closer and his lips came down on hers in a hungry, hot kiss. A kiss that said he would never let her go, and Catalina wanted to believe it. She never wanted to let him go either. Despite everything that seemed to stand between them now, she had never felt for anyone what she did for Jamie. Surely she never could again.
They fell together to the rumpled blankets of the bed, their bodies entwined. And for that moment it was all that mattered—even as she knew one moment could not last for ever.
When Catalina woke again, the rain was gone and watery sunlight pierced through the canvas walls of the tent. The air was growing warm, and she could hear the tumult of shouts and running footsteps from outside. It was day, and something was happening out there.
And Jamie was not with her. She was alone in the tent.
Catalina quickly pushed herself out of bed and grabbed her work clothes out of her trunk. The lace mantilla fluttered from the edge of the table like a ghost, a memory that seemed far away even though she had worn it only last night. She tucked it carefully into the depths of the trunk and hastily twisted her hair up into a tight knot.
As she dressed, she remembered last night, her wedding night, and all that had happened, good and bad. She worried that she didn’t know her new husband—and that perhaps she would not have time to come to know him either. Had she made a mistake? Had she moved too hastily?
But she had come to find that unless one moved hastily in wartime the opportunity could be lost for ever.
When she ducked out of the tent she found herself in the midst of chaos. Soldiers were rushing around amid wagons being loaded and horses being saddled.
Another nurse ran past, and Catalina grabbed her arm. ‘What is happening?’ she cried.
‘It is the push to Toulouse at last! The regiment’s orders have come.’
‘Already?’ Catalina had known this day was coming; it was why they had made camp here in the first place. But so very soon?
‘The regiment is moving out today, that is all I know,’ the nurse said. ‘But we are to stay a few more days to make sure the wounded are seen to.’
She ran off again, and Catalina knew she had to find Jamie. She made her way through the maze of tents, many of which were being taken down, and passed by the tangle of people and horses. At last she glimpsed him, talking to Colonel Chambers. She started towards him, only to feel a hand on her arm, holding her back hard.
She glanced back to find Hugh Webster smiling at her. ‘Mrs Moreno, I must talk to you….’
The strange, prickling