Addicted by Charlotte Featherstone Page A

As the six grays came to a prancing halt, Lindsay threw open the door and covered his face with his arm as snow, wild and angry, gusted inside the carriage.
    Lindsay could not help but notice how red-cheeked and shivering the footman was, despite the beaver hat and numerous layers of thick woolen capes. “The stallion is rearing in the box carriage, milord. Jenkins says that the animal has begun to suffer from the cold.”

    “Not acclimated yet,” Lindsay called over his shoulder to Wallingford. “I’ll ride him the rest of the way. That should warm him up.”
    “Bloody fool,” Wallingford yelled after him after Lindsay disembarked from the carriage. “You’ll get yourself killed riding that animal in this weather.”
    “I spent a fortune on him. I’ll be damned if I allow him to die from the cold. He’s going to stud my stables and he can’t very well perform when he’s frozen, can he?”
    “Damn it, Raeburn,” Wallingford grunted as he tossed his cheroot into a drift of snow. “You know I won’t let you go alone. Not in this weather. Bloody hell, man.”
    Lindsay tossed his friend a smile. “Come, it will be like old times, when we were neck-or-nothing youths galloping at breakneck speeds down the mountainside.”
    “Our bones were not so easily broken in our youth,” Wallingford grumbled as he raised the collar of his greatcoat to protect his face from the biting wind. “Nor were our heads, for that matter.”
    “You sound like Broughton when he used to chastise us for our foolish recklessness.”
    “I’m coming to believe that our dear friend was the more intelligent of the three.”
    “Come,” Lindsay said, not wanting to think of how he had betrayed Broughton, as well as Anais. Instead, he stalked to the box carriage to where his prized Arabian stallion was snorting and stomping.
    “Lead on, Raeburn,” Wallingford said, following in Lindsay’s wake. “And if we are so fortunate to make it home alive, thefirst to enter the stables may buy the other a warm pint of cider and a hot woman.”
    Lindsay gained the stallion’s saddle and took up the reins, turning the Arabian in the other direction. Through the snow, he ran the animal as safely as he could while ignoring the biting wind. On instinct, Lindsay guided the horse down a path he had followed countless times in his lifetime.
    As the familiar sites came into view, Lindsay slowed the stallion as it pranced along the icy path that overlooked the town of Bewdley nestled snugly in the vale below them. Ice pallets floated aimlessly atop the black waters of the Severn River, reminding Lindsay of the paintings he had once seen of the remnants of an iceberg after it had crumbled into the sea.
    Tossing its sleek black head, the Arabian’s billowing breaths misted gray and evaporated amongst the snowflakes that were circling about them. Tightening the reins, Lindsay settled the rearing animal before casting his gaze to the roof of St. Ann’s Church that dominated the view of the town.
    Below the ridge lay the sleepy village he had called home since birth. But tonight, the quiet little village of Bewdley was coming alive. Its residents were strolling down the cobbled streets, candles in hand as they made their pilgrimage to church. To the west of the town center, huddled in the valley where a small tributary broke away from the Severn and formed a creek, lay the first of four prominent estates that anchored Bewdley’s aristocratic society. Wallingford’s family estate bordered the forest. Broughton’s was to the east and only minutes down the ridge. His own home, Eden Park, rested on the other side of thebridge. And directly below him lay Anais’s home, which he had not seen in nearly a year.
    Scouring the Jacobean-style mansion from high above the valley, Lindsay blinked back the snowflakes that landed on his eyelashes. The earthy, acrid smell of wood burning in the cold air drifted up to meet him and he inhaled the scent, so familiar to