Leaping from the bed, she hurried to the armoire and found her winter cloak, slinging it around her shoulders before stuffing the folded paper into her stays.
Anxiety popped in her veins. Her palms sweat.
Moving to the bedchamber door, she stopped when another crash of thunder shook the house. What if she were caught? She might never have the chance to tell Eliza and Thomas—and Nathaniel—that she had come to prize freedom as they did.
Turning, she went to the small table and picked up the precious white flower that had sparked this mighty change. She reached for her Bible and turned to Second Corinthians, resting the now-wilted bloom on the verse that had come to mean so much to her. She stood back, fee
ling her pulse race, and her spirit calm. If she never returned, then God willing, the scripture by which the flower rested would tell them of her change of heart.
A smile lifted her mouth. Redemption didn’t come without a price, but with her trust now firmly in God’s hands she would prove to herself and to Him, that no matter what happened, she would not waver in the cause of liberty.
She was a patriot.
Chapter Thirty-two
A pounding at the door echoed through the lonely house, but nothing could break Cyprian from the grief that encased him like a stone tomb. The pounding continued, followed by muted yells. He ignored it and closed his eyes, wishing he could as easily close his soul against the pain. The weight of Camilla’s loss wrapped around his chest and crushed his ribs into his heart.
Suddenly the door burst open and a harried voice blasted up the staircase.
“Cyprian! Cyprian!”
Smith?
Anger exploded in Cyprian’s chest and he leapt from his seat, charging down the stairs.
“Smith, I—” He jerked to a halt. “What do you want, Andrew?”
The umbra of hatred sat deep in Andrew’s shadowed eyes as lightning flashed behind him. “I’m through.”
“Through?
“I’m through being your pawn. I will no longer do your bidding.”
Cyprian shouted from the depths of his pain. “You don’t have a choice!”
Andrew stalked nearer, mouth hinged down, and pulled a weapon from his cloak as another angry flash of light glinted off the pistol.
Cyprian tipped his head back and peeled the air with a bitter laugh that attempted to purge a measure of his suffering. “You’ll kill me?”
Andrew charged forward, slamming the point of the gun into Cyprian’s chest. “I’m not a thief and I’m not a murderer!” He lowered his gun and stepped back. “I challenge you to a duel.”
“A duel?” The man had always been daft. Cyprian glared, reading the resolve in Andrew’s shifting jaw and unwavering eyes. “We have no second, no doctor present.”
“I care not for such formalities.” He stood straighter and widened his stance. “I would see this ended. Tonight.”
Cyprian grinned.
So be it.
***
The storm outside raged as ferocious as the emotions that whipped inside Nathaniel’s chest.
He paced in front of the blazing fire as another bone-rattling clap of thunder crashed in the heavens. “Do not try to persuade me of her innocence, Thomas. We both know she is complicit.”
“I know I cannot persuade you to anything.” Thomas pressed his forearm against the wood beside the mantel and gestured with his other. “But do not speak with such finality until you have all the facts, Nathaniel. It hardly seems like her to do such a thing. Do you not know Kitty at all?”
The question stabbed. “I thought I did.”