Read Online The Reluctant Reformer by Lynsay Sands - Free Book Online

She’d landed with an “oomph” in the bushes below. They softened her landing somewhat, but not completely. The fall had been enough to knock the air from her lungs, and she had lain there in the drizzle for several moments, aware of nothing but her body’s desperate need for oxygen.
    Once she’d regained her breath, Maggie had eased to her feet and peered about, unsure whether to be relieved or unhappy that no one was around to note her bravery or her near calamity. Pushing such foolishness aside, she had moved quickly to the cover of the surrounding woods and slipped into them.
    Making her way through the woods along the laneway had seemed the safest bet. She hadn’t wished to take the lane itself and risk being spotted, but she also had wanted to avoid finding herself lost in the woods—keeping the lane in sight seemed the only option. Maggie had thought that as long as she kept the lane in sight, she would manage well enough.
    â€œHa!” she muttered now. Her plan had started out well enough, but then she had come across a river. There was a bridge over it on the lane that she had not realized they’d traversed. Worse, the bridge was still inplain view of the house, and her fear of being spotted had forced her to make her way deeper into the woods. Moving along the river in search of a place to cross, a shallow spot perhaps, she had not been concerned with getting wet. The constant drizzling rain and her fall into the damp bushes had already soaked her, so she had wandered along, moving farther and farther away from the lane, positive that soon she would find a safe spot to cross. Just a little farther. Just around this bend. Just around that curve.
    A fallen oak had appeared across her path, reaching just to the river’s edge, but not crossing it. She had been forced to make her way around, fighting with branches and brambles and moving deeper into the forest. Then she had pushed through a screen of underbrush…to find herself tumbling down an incline the foliage had hidden!
    At the bottom, Maggie found herself not only wet, but mud-covered. She wasn’t the sort to give up, though. Stubborn and prideful had been a couple of unattractive descriptions used for her in the past, and she admitted the designations were still true today. Determined to climb back up and continue on her way, she had found that the incline was impossible to scale. It was steep and slippery with mud from the rain, and her several attempts had only ended in lost footings and several behind-bruising falls. At last, she’d turned her determination to searching for an easier spot to climb. She had traveled an increasing distance from the river and the fallen tree, deeper into wilds, in search of that spot, following the curved and wending incline.
    Maggie wasn’t sure how far she’d journeyed before she discovered a place where the roots of a tree offeredenough purchase to pull up out of the small ravine in which she found herself. She had barely reached the top when the snapping of a branch had alerted her to the presence of a nearby animal. Normally the stalwart, non-nervous type, Maggie had not been too alarmed at first, but slowly she became aware of the creepy silence of the rest of the woods. The hair prickled at the back of her neck as she stood listening to the sounds of something making its way through the underbrush from the way she had come. Finding her heart lodging itself in her throat, Maggie felt her body grow numb with fear. As she realized the sounds were drawing nearer, she broke, turning on her heel and making a mad dash in the other direction—running willy-nilly until her fear had eased enough to realize the mistake she’d made. The stupidity of running blindly in the wrong direction had been a hard enough admission, but the fact that she no longer knew the right direction was even more dismaying.
    Maggie was now lost, completely and thoroughly. She was also