Velvet Embrace (37 page)

The two men worked frantically to pull the foal from its mother's body. Then Dominic used the knife to cut the cord tangled around its neck before it died of strangulation. When the small body had been safely deposited on the straw, John worked on the mare while Dominic gently wiped the foal clean.

Brie could have cried for joy when the little filly blinked and looked around curiously at her new surroundings, but several times during the next half hour, Brie laughed at the filly's wobbling attempts to stand up.

The mare, although limp from pain and weariness, finally struggled to her feet to accept her new offspring's suckling, while John watched proudly. Brie turned to Dominic to express her thanks, giving him a smile of such brilliant warmth that he was dazzled. It took him a moment, in fact, to understand why John had suddenly shouted in alarm.

When the trainer rushed past him into the corridor, Dominic recognized the ominous crackling sound and the nervous snorting of frightened horses. He leapt to his feet, telling Brie to stay put.

As he watched John scurry back down the loft ladder, he swore under his breath. Floating wisps of burning straw and hay followed John's descent, while smoke poured through the open trap door. The loft was on fire, Dominic noted grimly. And the doors at the end of the barn leading to the courtyard were shut tightly when they had been wide open an hour ago. Instinctively he knew they would be locked.

When he applied his shoulder to the doors, he realized they had been deliberately jammed shut. Meeting John's worried gaze, he told the trainer to find an implement to pry the doors open, then turned and quickly made his way back through the gathering smoke to Brie.

She was staring up at the flaming loft. Dominic pushed her back in the stall, sweeping up his discarded coat and cravat as he went. "Take off your pelisse," he commanded, dipping his own coat in the horse's water bucket. Doing the same to Brie's, he handed her his dripping cravat. "Now cover your head with this and stay here until I say differently." Lifting the half-filled bucket, he left her again.

Brie obeyed without protest, for the situation was far too serious even to consider arguing. Already the acrid smoke was making her eyes burn, and she could hear the frightened neighs of the horses above the growing roar of the flames. As a landowner, she well knew the danger of fire. She knew also that it was probably too late to save the barn. The fire had spread so rapidly that it must caught hold of the timbers by now. She only hoped they would be able to save the horses and perhaps the adjacent barns.

She donned her wet pelisse and wrapped the cravat around her head to cover her abundant tresses, then cautiously peered from the stall. The haze was far worse in the corridor. Dominic had closed the loft trap door, but smoke was still seeping through the cracks and flaming sparks were raining down from above. By straining, Brie could see that the two men were still trying to open the huge doors. She bit her lip, wondering if they would all die in a blazing inferno.

A moment later she felt a rush of wind against her face. Realizing the doors had finally given way. Brie closed her eyes and offered up a silent prayer of thanks. When she heard Dominic shout her name, she turned and gathered the new little filly in her arms, then started back down the corridor with her awkward burden.

She was amazed by how intense the heat was. She could hardly breathe, the air was so thick. She coughed, her lungs feeling as if they were on fire as she fought her way blindly through the smoke, following the sound of Dominic's voice.

He saw her first. Grasping her by the elbow, he threw a wet blanket around her shoulders and led her through the open doors into the courtyard. Then leaving her with Jacques, Dominic disappeared into the burning barn again.

Brie stumbled into the coachman's arms, drinking in great gulps of fresh air. She wouldn't relinquish the filly to him, though, and when she had recovered her breath, she carried her precious burden well away from the burning building, depositing the foal on a patch of grass.

She would have returned to the barn then, but she was forcibly detained by Jacques. He captured her arm, telling her very apologetically that his lordship had entrusted him to see to her safety. Brie pleaded, insisted, and even shouted at the Frenchman, but Jacques remained adamant. When she at last realized that he wouldn't let her go, Brie clenched her fists in frustration and turned helplessly to watch the fire.

The household servants had entered the fight to save the main barns. Men and even women were scurrying frantically to and fro, carrying buckets and wetting down blankets. Some had formed lines, passing the buckets up the ladders to the men on the roofs and back again, while others were dousing the walls of the nearest buildings, trying to prevent the flying sparks from taking hold. Only a hundred feet or so of cobblestone separated the burning barn from the rest of the stables. The entire yard was lit with a harsh yellow glow, and Brie could feel the tremendous heat even from where
she stood.

Her attention never wavered from the flames. Desperately worried, she bit her knuckles each time a fear-crazed horse came racing through the doors of the burning structure. Both John and Dominic had braved the thick smoke in order to rescue the horses, but she could see no sign of either man.

The roof of the small barn was a blazing inferno when John at last stumbled out. Brie gave a hoarse cry and broke away from Jacques, determined to help. The elderly trainer was coughing so badly that he could hardly stand. Putting an arm around his waist, Brie half dragged him across the courtyard, away from the flames.

"Too . . . much . . . smoke," he rasped between fits of coughing.
"Too . . . late.
Stanton tried . . . to save . . . Firefly. . . .
Couldn't get her out."

Brie felt her heart stop. Dear God, Dominic was still trapped inside the burning building! Knowing she had to try and save him, she began to run toward the fire.

John made a desperate lunge, grabbing hold of her arm and preventing her from moving. "No
! '
Tis
too late!"

"But he's still in there!" she sobbed, trying to wrench her arm free.

But as John had warned, it was too late. One of the main roof timbers of the barn came crashing down.

Brie screamed, watching in horror as flames filled the doorway. She couldn't believe what she was seeing. Dominic could not have been trapped beneath the flaming wreckage. Not him. Not when she loved him.

The heat of the fire was too intense to allow anyone near, and Brie could only wait, praying desperately that any moment Dominic would appear through the wall of flames. But the fire continued to burn, and there was no sign of him.

At last the entire roof gave way. The resulting explosion was deafening, the flames shooting upward to light up the night sky.

Brie stared in shock at the blazing wreckage. When she
realized that Dominic could not have possibly escaped alive, she sank to her knees, too stunned even to cry. A terrible emptiness burned in the pit of her stomach, and there was a scorching ache in her throat that had nothing to do with the acrid smoke still choking the air.

She hardly noticed when Katherine placed a comforting hand on her shoulder. "You mustn't be upset, Brie," Katherine said gently. "You can build a new barn. Why don't you come inside? Cook has prepared food for everyone, and
Garby
and Caroline are tending the injured in the hall. No one was hurt
badly,
thank the Lord, although there were a few burns. You should come into the house and change out of those filthy clothes."

Numbly, Brie looked down at her wet, soot-streaked pelisse. Then she shook her head. Katherine obviously didn't know what had happened to Dominic. Brie couldn't tell her, though. She couldn't put the horrible truth into words. "Please, Katie," she whispered, "I want to stay here. Will you just see to John?"

She was grateful when Katherine left her alone. Still kneeling on the cobblestones, she bowed her head.

After a time, the rain came. It was only a light drizzle, but it was greeted by shouts of triumph by the firefighters, for even though the small barn would continue to burn, the danger to the other buildings had passed. Men would watch through the night, and in the morning they would begin to clear away the charred rubble.

Brie couldn't share their joy. She was too numb to care about what happened to the barns. She couldn't feel the rain either. Icy streams ran down her face and soaked her skin, making her shiver, but she wasn't aware of it. After a while she began to cry, softly at first, then in racking sobs.

How ironic, she thought. Dominic's death had made her realize how much she loved him. In spite of her efforts to resist him, the magnetic attraction she had always felt for him had developed into something stronger, something more vital. But even loving him was ironic. He probably would have laughed to see her crying for him, mocking her pain as he had everything else.

Tears were still streaming down her cheeks when a tall figure loomed before her. It looked so much like Dominic that Brie covered her face with her hands, thinking she must be seeing a ghost.

But the hard hands that gripped her shoulders were real enough, and the familiar masculine voice was Dominic's. "Are you hurt?" he asked urgently, pulling Brie to her feet.

Brie stared up at him, not comprehending. Dominic looked worse than a London chimney sweep. His clothes were torn and filthy, and he was covered with grime as black as his hair. But even with his face streaked with soot and his dark hair plastered down by rain, Brie had never seen a more beautiful sight.

When Dominic sharply repeated his question, she shook her head. "I . . . I thought . . . you were dead," she said in a hoarse whisper.

Dominic laughed and pulled her into his arms. "Almost, but
I
'm hard to kill."

Relief flooded through her. He was alive! He hadn't died in the fire. Brie clung to him, burying her face against his wet shoulder. It was a long moment before the old suspicions came rushing back, and then she drew away, her eyes flashing.
"You beast!
You let me think you were dead!"

Giving her a smile so tender that Brie felt her heart melt, Dominic drew her back into his arms. "I'm sorry, ma belle," he said soothingly. "I would have come sooner had I been able, but I was unconscious for a while. Jacques said he almost despaired when he couldn't revive me, but the rain finally woke me."

Looking around her.
Brie suddenly realized that the Frenchman had disappeared. "But however did you escape?" she asked.

"The far side.
Your steward—Tyler, I think his name was—
took an ax to the wall and cleared an opening. I managed to get the mare out just before the loft collapsed. That's the last I remember."

"But you weren't injured?"

"My lungs smart like hell, but I'll recover."

Searching his face, Brie shuddered. "You should not have gone back in there."

"I had to," Dominic said simply. "Otherwise you would have done something idiotic like try to save the horses on your own—foolish girl." Yet he took the sting out of his words by lowering his mouth and brushing her lips gently with his.