Bound In Blood (The Adams' Witch Series Book 1) Read Free Page A

Isabella slipped into the main room, making sure to avoid the areas that creaked. She spared a glance toward her parents’ bedroom. Curtains hid their sleeping bodies from view.
    She crept further into the hall, the smell of barley still staining the air from the vegetable pottage cooked earlier, and escaped out the cottage door. Months of secret meetings allowed her to do this with little error and she soon felt the cool night air on her face.
    The full moon proved enough light to see her way. Picking up her skirt, she ran across the grass, past the hog pen, and just inside her father’s barn. No Thomas.
    Out of view from the small cottage, she allowed the fear to sweep through her. His letter implied importance, but might this be the day Thomas did not show? Might it be he revealed their love to the magistrate and the magistrate forbid his son to see her again? The feeling seized her, snapping her nerves like twigs.
    Her mind so fixed in doubt, her heart gripped in agony, she did not hear the rustling of footsteps over the barn floor.
    “Good day, Isabella.”
    She whirled. Thomas.
    Suppressing a smile bubbling like a brook inside her, she dipped and said, “Good day.”
    She tried to steady her breath, which came at her now in rapid gulps. The once wash of fear turned to relief, leaving her in a stew of mixed agitation.
    “Are you well?” Concern darkened his smile and his usual light eyes were shadowed over. His whole body was rigid like the high masts from the great ships her father told her of, the ones that brought him to this new world.
    “I am.”
    He considered her for a moment, his eyes taking in her flushed complexion bonneted by loose blonde strands that had separated from her braid. “I am sorry I have come later than usual. I almost did not come at all.”
    Isabella’s heart beat like the flutter of wings. “But your letter spoke of importance.”
    “I have news of the utmost importance.” He stared mute for a moment. “Another woman was taken today. Father is so very angry and vows to let no evil pass his notice. I do not want them to mistake…”
    A smile shadowed her face, a secret in the dark, but she suppressed it. It was not a good thing Thomas liked her enough to defy his father, endanger his honor, his life. “I understand.”
    “I am tormented worrying over you. ‘Tis not safe.”
    Isabella stepped toward him, uneasy over the turn of his face, and then paused, minding herself. It was not as if they were pledged to one another, nor did her situation in life recommend her. “My father does not speak of this to me.”
    “I doubt if anything should reach his ears. He is hardly ever in town, choosing to work his fields instead.”
    “‘Tis true. My father works hard.”
    “He may know of Mrs. Worth though.”
    Isabella clenched her fists around her dress. “Mrs. Worth? I am sure it cannot be so.”
    “It is so. Father said.”
    “I doubt your father not. I am…confused. That is all.”
    “Everyone is not like you and I.” Thomas reached for her. Untouched, his hand fell in the empty space between them. “Mrs. Worth was spotted in the woods late last night in the midst of making a fire. They found evidences of previous fires there.”
    “Tell me, who found her?”
    “My father did not say, only revealing that Mrs. Worth has been crying out her innocence ever since.” Thomas moved in, his face in earnest. “But Isabella, you know we cannot believe her. ‘Tis all lies. Remember what the churchwardens have said? Listening to anything they say is blasphemous. She might trick us with a spell, do harm to us and free herself.”
    Isabella looked away. “I cannot believe that Mrs. Worth has signed with the devil, Thomas. She has a husband and two small children.”
    He took her chin in his hand and made her look in his eyes. They were light again, an intense blue that writhed her insides to knots. “Because you are too good. You cannot fathom anyone being unlike yourself, but it is