Free England's Perfect Hero by Suzanne Enoch

going to die, but I knew you weren't."
    "How did you know that?"
    "Because of the letter you wrote me, where you said you were going to teach me how to jump fences when I was old enough. Andrew wanted to show me how last year when you were in Scotland, but I don't want anybody but you to teach me."
    Robert swallowed. He'd forgotten about that letter. It was the last one he'd written, dropped in the mail satchel the night of… the night everything had changed. The night hell had begun.
    Finally the house came into sight. "You should have let Andrew teach you," he muttered, kicking Tolley into a run.
    As they reached the stables he slid out of the saddle, grabbed the sack of fish, and flung it beside the crate of rose cuttings. He strode for the house and shoved open the front door before Dawkins could reach it.
    "Where the devil have you been?" Tristan snapped, as he emerged from his office.
    "Out." Robert ignored his brother's angry look and headed for the stairs.
    "With Edward."
    "Yes."
    Below him, Tristan cursed. "You are not to gallop off with Edward without telling someone where you're going first."
    "Fine."
    "Robert! I'm not finished talking to you!"
    As far as Robert was concerned, he was. The panic grabbed hold of him again, clasping heavy, clawed fingers around his chest until he couldn't get enough air into his lungs.
    "Damn it," he hissed, slamming into his bedchamber and shoving the door closed behind him. "Stop, stop, stop."
    So Edward's faith in him was based on a stupid, naive letter, one he'd written before he knew anything. He remembered it now, remembered chatting about how cold it had been when they'd crossed the Spanish border into France, and how optimistic he'd been on hearing word that Bonaparte had abdicated. The fighting was over, they'd all thought. He'd intended to be home soon, hoping that his regiment wouldn't be one of those called on to remain in the area and enforce the peace. They had been, but he hadn't been with them.
    "Robert!"
    He ignored Tristan pounding on his door. In fact, he barely heard it as he paced the floor, trying to outrun the blackness coming up behind him.
    He'd submitted papers asking for leave, and they'd been granted. What was left of his regiment had therefore thought he'd gone back to England, while his family had thought him still in Spain.
    "Robert, open the damned door! I'm not joking!"
    The anger and fear in Tristan's voice wrenched him back to the present. He stalked to the door and yanked it open. "I would never let anything happen to Edward," he rasped.
    Whatever Tristan had been about to say, he closed his mouth over it. "God, Bit, are you hurt?" he asked instead. "You're white as a—"
    Robert slammed the door again. "Go away," he snarled, leaning his forehead against the cool, heavy wood. "I just want some quiet."
    "All right." After a few moments he heard Tristan's boots padding back down the hallway.
    As Robert took another strangled breath and turned to resume his pacing, his gaze fell on his gardening clothes, which he'd left draped over a chair. He needed to get the fish in the ground before they attracted every stray cat in Mayfair, and if he didn't plant the cuttings today, he might as well do what Lucinda had suggested and throw them away.
    His hands shook as he shed his greatcoat, slinging it over a bedpost. His coat and waistcoat followed, and he was able to concentrate enough to actually hang them back in the dressing closet.
    Tristan kept offering to find him a valet, obviously not understanding how important it was that no one have free access to him, his private rooms, or his things. Dressing himself and tending to his own things was one of the few ways he had of demonstrating to himself that he could still function as a man.
    By the time he'd pulled on his oldest pair of boots and grabbed up the heavy pair of gloves Lucinda had loaned him, he was surprised to realize that the desperate pounding of his heart had subsided, and that his breathing had