Free Saving Simona (Alone In The World Trilogy) by Rebekah Blackmore Page A

you shall be married by the spring’s end! I cannot be alone with my thoughts, not yet. I need my youngest to return to the safety of my arms.” He took a shuddering breath. “I have more than enough left to pay the reward. Winifred’s betrothed has given me a generous dowry for her hand in marriage, plus the payment that he has made into what is left of company. It is thrice the amount I am suggesting. Even with the reward money gone, I shall have more than enough to get by.” 
    “Just give it a little more time, Simon, that’s all that I am asking. We do not know what the kidnapper plans to do with Simona, or what he has already done to her. For all we know, she could be deceased. If the kidnapper gets word that you are offering a reward for her to be returned, who is to say that you will not simply receive her body?” Solomon sounded exasperated.
    The room fell silent. After a few moments, Simon’s voice echoed in the room once more. “She’s my youngest child,” he said. “She’s my namesake. I’ll give the men another two weeks to try and find her, but the moment they fail, I will alert others of my intent.”
    Gia felt a stab of excitement in her gut at the prospect of winning the reward. She chose to listen to nothing more of the conversation, and quickly made her way back down to her room and lied back down in the bed, trying to figure out what excuse she would use to let Solomon let her go free and bring the girl back.
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
    5
    March 1871
     
    A few days later, Gia’s chance walked into the house in the form of one Luciana Anne Dickens.
    Solomon had been in Gia’s room, talking to her and checking the injury to make sure that the wound was healing correctly. They were discussing Solomon’s past, as well as Gia’s. However, anything after the age of twelve was adapted to make her life seem more enjoyable that it really had been.
    Solomon had gone first, telling Gia more about his siblings and his parents, followed by his favorite Christmas memory. “I was nine or ten,” he had said, smiling at the thoughts, “and my elder brother, Justus, had just gotten his first horse. He was seven years older than me, and was saving up to purchase a farm several miles out of town for his sweetheart and himself, so my parents figured that he would need a horse to get him started on his new life.”
    Gia thought for a moment before asking, “How old are you now?”
    “Me?” Solomon looked up at the sudden question. “I am twenty-seven.” He shook his head. “Anyway, back to the story. Justus wanted to try out his new horse, and he wanted to take each of us children out in turn. He took the baby of the family first, Estelle. She was five, at the time. He then let Callie ride alone, since she was a year older than he was. He took me last, and we went for the longest ride.” His eyes twinkled in remembrance. “We raced for a miles and miles, as fast as that horse would go. Once Argo had worn himself out, however, we stopped by a field and ate our weight in blackberries before we rode home for Christmas dinner with our parents and Callie’s betrothed.” He looked back at Gia. “What about you? What is your best Christmas memory?”
    Gia wracked her mind, trying to remember what would be the best one that happened before she had been taken. When she could remember none, she shrugged, saying, “My family never really celebrated Christmas when I was younger, and I went to live with…” she paused, “a different family when I was twelve when my parents fell ill.”
    Solomon nodded, reaching out and squeezing her hand. “I am sorry,” he said sympathetically. “I understand. I lost my father two summers back, and it still makes any sort of celebration difficult to enjoy.”
    Gia nodded, saying nothing more. She looked down at the quilt that Solomon had placed on the bed the night before, when Gia had been complaining about being cold. It was checkered blue and green flannel,