The MacGregor's Lady by Grace Burrowes

tone, this might as well have been halfway to the North Pole.
    “If we change teams regularly, and the roads are well traveled, we could easily be there by nightfall, as the earl suggested.” Provided Hannah did not first do away with her aunt and force the coach to stop so she might dispose of the remains.
    They had changed teams twice when the great, lumbering coach went swaying off to the side of the road. Something snapped loudly underneath, and the conveyance swung wildly, bumping along the snowy ground for a good twenty yards before coming to a canted halt.
    “Oh, my! My goodness! Dearest, my remedies, please. The headache and the nerve tonic both.”
    “Ladies!” The earl’s voice cut through Aunt’s ranting. “Is everyone of a piece in there?”
    His voice came from above, from the road, and Hannah felt an undignified spike of relief to know he was about and uninjured.
    “We’re fine,” she said, unlatching the window and lowering it. “A little tossed about, but well enough. What happened?”
    “Snapped a wheel,” he said. “Probably hit a rock hidden by the snow, and it will take some work to repair it. You’re likely as warm as you can be in there, so sit tight until we get the team unhitched.”
    Except unhitching the team took a good deal of time and cursing and rocking the vehicle about. The wheelers grew frantic when the leaders were walked off and the weight of the coach had to be balanced by only two horses. Hannah could hear Balfour’s voice as he crooned to the horses, a soothing patter that belied the rising wind and dropping temperatures.
    “This is awful,” Aunt pronounced. “Just awful, Hannah. If only we hadn’t arrived in the depths of winter.”
    “We’ve arrived to take advantage of the social Season, Aunt, but had Step-papa considered our welfare, he might have bought us passage to London itself and allowed us a departure when spring was advanced.”
    For once, Aunt had no reproof to make.
    “Ladies?” Balfour, up on his enormous horse, spoke near the window. “We’re going to have to get you out of there now. The wheelers won’t be content to hold the thing when the leaders are gone, and it will be dark sooner than is convenient.”
    “Gone?” Aunt Enid seized on the word. “Where are they going? Where are we going?”
    “The coach can’t go anywhere,” Balfour said. “But we’re only about five miles from the last coaching inn. I propose to send the coachy back with the leaders for another conveyance. One of you can ride the second leader, and the groom will take the wheelers.”
    “You go, Aunt.”
    “We have four horses, though,” Aunt Enid said. “Five, if you count your mount, my lord. Why not put Hannah on one of the wheelers, or take her up with you?”
    “The wheelers are green,” Balfour said. “In this footing, they aren’t safe for a lady to ride bareback astride, nor is it safe to ask a horse to carry a double burden.”
    Aunt’s eyebrows rose. “Astride?” And then those same brows came crashing down. “That will leave you and Hannah…” Her voice trailed off, and Hannah saw the befuddled workings of her Aunt’s mind follow the situation to its conclusion. “It will be for only an hour or two, won’t it, dear? You’ll be all right?”
    So much for the selfless devotion of a doting aunt. “I’ve dressed very warmly,” Hannah said. “I’m sure we’ll be fine.”
    The coachy came up astride one of the sturdy beasts who normally pulled the carriage, the groom behind him on one curvetting wheeler while the other danced nervously on the end of its reins.
    “We’ll have somebody back here for you before dark,” the coachman said. “Moonrise at the latest.”
    Except a lowering layer of clouds would obscure any moonrise.
    “We’ll manage,” Balfour said, glancing at the sky. “Best hurry. There’s snow waiting to come down.”
    “Aye.” The coachy moved the horse along. Getting Aunt Enid situated aboard the second leader