Follow My Lead (36 page)

“Oh, Herr Duke,” Wurtzer said in German, relief apparent in his voice, but not staying long. “I just came back from the bonfire—or its ashes, as it died out. But Brauer was still there and very drunk, and he says he’s going to come after the Englishman who stole his business.”

Jason’s mind, alert though it was, had to focus back to find Brauer in his memory (as his mind, during the bonfire, had been predictably elsewhere). A younger man, true, but a shorter one, too. Hell, Winn could likely best him in a fair fight. “I wouldn’t worry too much about Brauer,” Jason drawled in the man’s language. “Drunken boasting has felled more than one man.”

“It’s not Brauer I worry about—he has brothers. Seven of them. And all are very protective of their ‘little’ brother—and their family’s income, which is from the pub . . .”

Right then, Jason heard a noise. Some revelry, out in the distance, beyond the loft, beyond the street Wurtzer’s establishment sat on. He rose and peered out the window. There in the distance, he could see the last embers of the bonfire in the town square, and a contingent of what had to be the burliest, drunkest men in the town. Awake, and walking directly toward them.

“Right . . .” Jason drawled, coming back down on his haunches to face Wurtzer, “we should probably go.”

“I’ll have my beloved Heidi try and distract them in the main court. You can take the back way out of the barn, and through the alley to the street below, yes?”

“Yes, but”—Jason narrowed his eyes and reached out, catching Wurtzer’s arm, preventing him from leaving in all haste, as the older man obviously wished to do—“we haven’t been paid yet for our services yesterday.”

Wurtzer nervously patted his pockets, coming up with a small pouch, jingling with coins. “Here—this is all I have on me. The rest is in the safe, and I don’t think there is time to get it.”

Jason weighed the pouch in his hand. “This isn’t nearly enough. We agreed upon—”

“I know, I’m sorry!” Wurtzer cried. “But please, you have to go—I told them you left last evening, but if they find you here, they will tear apart my barn, wreck my taproom . . . and Brauer’s son is married to the mayor’s daughter, I would not be able to . . .”

Jason rolled his eyes. Not only was he losing the argument, they were losing time.

“All right then, what about some horses?” he asked. “Just to borrow. I’ll make sure they get back to you.”

Wurtzer seemed to mull this for far too long a time, considering how much closer the angry voices of the brothers Brauer got with every tick of the clock. “Which direction do you go?” Wurtzer asked finally.

“Southeast.”

“Take two horses. Head toward Regensburg. Leave them at the posting house on Hohenfelser Strasse. A man named Hecht runs the place, he’ll make sure they get back to me.”

That was fair, Jason decided, and considering the speed with which the drunken march approached them, it was a deal worth taking. He shook Wurtzer’s hand.

“Remember—side door to barn, through the alley. Hurry!” And with that Wurtzer was gone.

Jason turned back, finding Winn already lacing up her boots.

“We have to go?” she asked, seemingly already knowing the answer.

“Yes,” Jason said, locating his own shoes and socks. “He paid us what he could and has given us leave to borrow some horses, but yes, we need to go and go now.”

“You mean horse, singular,” she amended, grabbing Jason’s coat off its makeshift hook and locating the packet of letters in the breast pocket. She gently transferred them to her dress pocket before tossing him his jacket.

“Winn, we don’t have time to argue about your silly fear of horses—”

“You’re right, we don’t,” she countered. “But believe me when I tell you that I have never sat successfully on a horse by myself, and if I have to ride one, I will fall off and break my neck. And while that would annoy, it would also slow us down considerably.”

“So will riding two to a horse!” Jason replied in a rushed whisper.

“Then I will walk beside you,” she countered. And brooking no further opposition, she marched to the loft door, wrenched it open, and proceeded down the ladder.

Jason’s brow came down. The last thing he wanted to do was argue with her right now. In fact, this is not what he had in mind for the morning after—he would have much rather have awoken with the sun, and awoken her with . . . other activities. But instead, a mad dash out the door was required, and therefore any other activities, as well as any arguing, would have to wait its turn.

“Fine,” Jason grumbled (to himself it seemed, as Winn was already down the ladder) as he followed after her, “but the first thing I’m doing when we get back to England is teaching you to ride.”

“Truly, Winn—riding is not that difficult. I’ll have you seated on your own and at a gallop in a fortnight, three weeks at the most,” Jason said nonchalantly, shading his eyes from the midmorning sun as he settled in more comfortably to his spot against the fir tree he had commandeered for a nap.

“We should not dawdle here,” Winn said as she tugged at her locket, pacing back and forth in front of Jason. “We have to keep moving, get to Regensburg, then—”

“Then Vienna, I know.” Jason sighed.

“Then why have we even stopped? We should be on the road!”

“And we will be—as soon as Wolfgang has had a bit of a rest. He’s not a machine, you realize.”

Wolfgang, munching on the bit of grass within his reach, tethered to the tree as he was, looked up in what Jason liked to think was agreement. Then of course, went back to his munching ways.

“You simply
had
to choose the one horse in the stables that wants to eat me,” Winnifred grumbled.

“No, I simply had to choose the one horse in the stables that was of a size to carry both of us,” Jason retorted. “And as he is carrying both of us, Wolfgang gets tired more easily and has to rest a bit, and we move slower than you’d like to Regensburg.” He opened one eye and regarded Winn carefully. Her tense shoulders, her labored, sharp pacing—something was decidedly off about her today.

“What’s wrong?” he asked softly, making her stumble ever so briefly on her well-worn path.

“Nothing,” she replied. “Just eager to be on the road.”

But it wasn’t nothing. Something odd had overtaken her almost since the moment they woke up. Ever since they managed to saddle and sneak Wolfgang out of Wurtzer’s stables and through the alley, down the quiet streets of Lupburg and into the new day. Winn had said little to Jason once they were on the road, and he had more than once envied the position she had, sitting across his lap, thinking that she would use the time to sleep a few more hours. But instead, she was wide awake and unbearably stiff in her seat, as if she were trying to maintain some distance and decorum between the two of them. And as such, she wasn’t really moving with them, she was moving against them. Every time they hit a bump in the road or he wanted to urge Wolfgang from a trot into a gallop, her stiff form would bang against him, knocking his chin into the back of her head or her temple against his nose.

It was trying, to say the least.

And how different from how she had been the night before!

Jason was not one to feel the after effects of only a few beers, and as such, he remembered the night before with amazing clarity. Every gasp, every moan, every inch of her body exposed to the moonlight was seared on his brain like a cattle brand. Every moment, every smooth, eager movement of said moonlit body belonged to him, and would forever. She had been so free the night before, giving herself to him, and he took it, every single inch that he could . . .

“Oh God, I’m an idiot,” Jason scolded himself, scooting upright against the tree.

“Why?” Winn asked, not stalling in her pacing.

“Come, sit down,” he said coaxingly, but only earning a cocked eyebrow from Winn.

“Again, why? I’ll be sitting enough once we’re back on that bloody horse,” she retorted, earning her a hurt look from Wolfgang, whose admiration of Winn was dwindling by the minute.

“I am an absolute brute and a moron. Winn”—he looked at her imploringly—“you must be sore. After . . . last night. Riding a horse all morning must have been the last thing you wished to do.”

But Winn only looked at him strangely, the continued pacing. “Don’t be ridiculous, I’m fine.”

“You are?” he replied skeptically. “I know it . . . I know
I
caused you some pain last night.”

“Did you?”

“Yes, and by the stiffness of your pacing I’d say you can feel the effects of it.”

She shook her head. “I’ve simply been sitting on a horse too long. Again, I’m fine.”

Then a thought dawned on him. He might have a perfectly clear recollection of the previous evening, but she had drunk a great deal more, was a good deal smaller, and was less used to it than he. “Winn—last night, what we did . . . you remember what we did, don’t you?”

“Of course I remember,” she said immediately, her face going up in flames. “But I don’t know why you persist in talking about it.”

“Fine,” Jason replied, holding up his hands. “We do not have to talk about it.” And then, while his male brain took a huge sigh of relief in that he did not have to chitchat about the meanings behind last evening’s activities, his conscience, his damn moral soul, knew that he could not run from this conversation . . . and neither could she.

“At some point, however,” he drawled, stalling Winn yet again in her stiff pacing. “It is a subject we should likely broach.”

“I do not see why,” Winn replied on a sigh.

“Because it changes things between us. That’s why,” Jason replied, sitting up. Then, with a smile, “Really, for someone so intelligent, you can be terrifically dense at times.”

That did it. A light bit of teasing earned him her full attention. She stopped pacing then and regarded him through narrowed eyes. Then, deciding between delaying the inevitable and giving in to it, and obviously choosing the latter, asked, “How does it change anything?”

How does it change anything? Jason stared at her, nonplussed. It changed everything. And for some unknown reason, an act that should have brought them closer together only managed to have the skittish sparrow pulling away from him. It made it so he felt that he couldn’t touch her—even though he had laid claim to taking her hand or letting his fingers fall on that spot at the back of her neck for weeks now.

“It changes things because it makes us . . . involved.”

“And how were we not involved with each other before? You and I have been joined at the hip ever since leaving Dover. I’d say we are fairly involved.”

“Oh for God’s sake.” Jason rolled his eyes, knowing full well that his explanations were inept at best. “Why the hell is it that women talk about their feelings all the time, and I get the one woman in the world who would rather do anything but?” He stood, brushing off his pants and came to stand in front of her. And then, testing her limits, reached out and took her by the shoulders. She did flinch, ever so slightly, causing Jason’s nerves to prick up, but she did not pull away.

“I meant that . . . our feelings are involved. Something happened between us. Something basic and primal and—”

“And drunken,” Winn concluded. She looked him dead in the eyes. “And it happened. And that’s all there is to it.”

“No, that is not,” Jason countered, his voice taking on an edge of annoyance. “But in some respects, you are correct. It
did
happen. And we
were
drinking, and as such it shouldn’t have, but it cannot be denied, so—”

“Wait.” Winn held up a hand, stopping his speech. “Why shouldn’t it have?”

“Because . . . you were . . . untouched, as it were.” Goddamn but finding tentative words for this conversation was difficult, and as such, Jason decided to give up on it. “Oh, to hell with it. You were a virgin, Winn. You didn’t know what you were doing. And I took advantage of that, and you.”

Winn, still holding his eyes, her hand still up in the air, froze. Then, a giggle. Then another one. Then complete, doubled-over laughing.

“Not the reaction I was expecting,” Jason replied, taking his hands off Winn’s shoulders and crossing them over his chest.

“Oh, Jason. Did you honestly think that I didn’t know what I was doing? Taking you by the hand and leading you back to the loft?”

“Well . . . sort of,” he replied, his brow coming down. He remembered her glassy-eyed approach last night, her siren dancing, newfound and graceful all at once. It was the movements of someone stepping into a brave new world.

“Sadly, you have confused innocence with ignorance. Jason,” she said, looking up at him, “I have read every book to be found in the Bodleian Library. I’ve read all the poetry and studied all the paintings. I knew exactly what I was doing.” Then she looked down and gathered her courage before meeting his eyes again. “And there were no feelings . . . no emotions involved whatsoever.”