Hannah Howell (5 page)

She began to pace, careful not to make a sound as she walked out her tension.

 

 

“Curse them. Curse them all to hell,” Revan hissed as he stood up, rubbing the stiffness out of his body.

“They are still there?” Tess spoke as softly as he did even though she sat by his horse.

“Aye and it looks as if they plan to camp here tonight.”

“I see. They mean to sit right here until they find something—anything.”

“Aye—us or our trail. Ye would have thought, after all these hours, they would have given up. I fear one of them has enough knowledge about tracks to ken those by the pool were very fresh—too fresh for us to have gotten far away.”

“Well, Uncle occasionally found a lout with a hint of wit in his fat head.”

“That hint could mean our death,” he said darkly. He frowned for a moment, continuing to work the stiffness out of his body.

“Mayhaps I should just go to them,” she said at last.

Stopping abruptly, he scowled at her though he knew she couldn’t see him in the shadows. “Ye have the wish to be a martyr, do ye?”

“Oh, aye, ’tis ever been my plan to die young by some dramatic self-sacrificing gesture,” she drawled. A minute later she sighed, knowing their precarious position was straining her temper. “I but thought I would have a better chance of staying alive—at least for a while. They would cut ye down without a moment of hesitation.”

“And how do ye think ye could save yourself in what little time ye might be granted?”

“I havena even a hint but I suspect I could think of something. And then, there
is
my family.”

“Who are days away
if
ye could even get word to them. I couldna get help for you for days, either, and I truly doubt ye would be given even a few days by Thurkettle. I am still certain that his plan is to use this incident to be rid of you. ’Tis too good a chance to gain all he wants yet come away looking as if he is a victim.”

“Aye, and that is something Uncle would dearly love. Well, what do
ye
think we ought to do?”

“Not we—
I
will do something.
Ye
will sit right here—safe and hidden away.”

“So now who wishes to be a martyr? Are ye sure ye are a mere knight and not some lordling? Ye spit out orders like some earl.”

“There are times when ye have to be a bit of both,” he murmured, staring at their belongings as he rubbed a hand over his chin. “I must lead them away from here. The trick is convincing them ye are with me.”

She stood up and moved a little closer to him. “What happens after ye lead them away?”

“I will lose them, then make my way back here.” He crouched to roll up their bedding.

“So simple. Did ye happen to forget that they will be aiming arrows at you, trying their utmost to bring ye down, hurl ye right out of your saddle?”

“Nay, I dinna forget, but we have seen that they are very poor archers.” Once his bedding was secure, he began to afix her wet clothes to the pile.

Trying to see what he was doing, she edged a little closer to him. “If Uncle found one man who can read tracks well, perhaps he found one who might be able to hit what he aims for—even if the target moves swiftly.”

“I will have to risk that.”

“Why canna we simply stay here? Isna it a good defensive position?”

He glanced toward her. “We could make a stand, but there are five of them and only two of us. That is assuming ye can fight with sword, arrow, or dirk.”

“I have a wee bit of skill,” she said defensively. “More skill than some of Uncle’s men.” She stared down at her small hands. “My greatest problem is that bows, and other weapons, arena made for people of my stature.”

“Well, any skill would help if all else fails, but I would rather not be pressed into such a corner. Even Thurkettle’s simpleminded fools could think of smoking us out, setting up a siege until we ran out of supplies, fetching more men if we stayed here long enough.”

“Enough.” She held up one hand. “I can see it all too clearly. Do ye plan to do this now?”

He nodded as he continued to work. “Where they are now will allow me to slip out, then choose when I let them see me.” Standing up, he picked up his clothed bedroll. “There, how does that look?”

She frowned. The cave was too dark to see his invention clearly. It appeared vaguely human in form. “Is it meant to be me?”

He nodded.

“Well,” she said slowly. “I am a wee bit limp about the arms and legs . . . and where is my head?”

“I will place your hat on top of it. Since I will have it in front of me I hoped they wouldna notice it’s, er, a wee bit limp. They will be behind me, their view of this severely hindered.”

“And ’tis growing darker out,” she murmured. “ ’Twill probably work,” she reluctantly admitted, not wanting him to do as he planned.

After setting his odd creation back down, he picked up a stick and began to write in the dirt. “Now, if I dinna return . . .” he began as she drew closer to watch him.

“That isna the wisest thing to say if ye intend for me to maintain some air of calm,” she muttered as she sat by his side.

“Ye dinna seem the sort to suffer from swoons or the like.”

“I am not. However, I am also not some hardened knight with a strong sword arm. Nor do I wish to be one who waves the men off to battle with smiles and pride. There may be no choice left us, but, necessary as it might be, I dinna like this. I ken very well it can go all wrong. Ye could at least act as if there is little chance of failure. I willna believe it, but it would give me something to use to lie to myself.” She sighed when she saw the brief flash of his smile. “What are ye writing?”

“Here is the way to reach my ally—Simon. Also, this tells you what to say so that he kens ye are one with us, an ally as well. He could take you to your family and safety.” He waited until she studied it, then nodded. “Ye have a dirk, aye?”

“Aye. Do ye?” She struggled to hide her fear.

“Aye. I have my sword, my bow, and my dagger. I doubt I shall use any of them. S’truth, I dinna plan to let them draw that close to me.” He smoothed his hand over her damp hair. “I will be back, Tess.”

She did not believe a word of it. Looking up at him, she studied his shadowed face. She was terrified. It could all too easily be the last time she ever saw him. Impulsively, she cupped his handsome face in her hands and kissed him. It startled her a little when he swiftly wrapped his arm around her shoulders and returned her tentative kiss with a deep, fierce one.

“Good luck,” she managed to whisper when the kiss ended.

Revan stared at her. A moment ago his mind had been filled with his plans for pulling them free of the danger they were in. Now it was filled with Tess and the heady warmth of her kiss. He did not want to ride out and play hide-and-seek with Thurkettle’s men. He wanted to stay with Tess. He wanted to see what little his shirt covered of her lithe body. He wanted to kiss and touch every silken inch of her. That kiss had been sweet—dangerously sweet. Inwardly cursing, he grabbed up his lifeless riding companion and strode toward his horse, forcing his thoughts back to survival.

Tess said nothing as he prepared himself. She just sat where he had left her.

“Revan,” she finally said as he stood at the mouth of the cave. “Mayhaps it willna mean much, but if this does fail, if ye dinna return, I will make very sure they all pay dearly.”

He stared at her for a moment. “It means a lot,” he murmured, then left.

Picking up her dirk from the cave floor, Tess set it in her lap. For a while there was silence, then came shouts and the sound of galloping horses. She closed her eyes and prayed. It was going to be a very long night.

“Tess?”

“Revan, ye fool,” she hissed, carefully easing her grip on her dagger, “I almost threw this at you.”

Edging into the cave and tugging his tired mount in behind him, Revan murmured, “Well, at least ye were alert.”

She watched his shadowy form as he moved to light the fire. A hundred different emotions assaulted her as the firelight revealed his weary face. She could not make herself move from where she still crouched at the back of the cave, but simply stared at him as he unsaddled his horse.

“I finally lost the fools through pure good fortune and the help of darkness.”

“Good,” she managed to croak out. She wondered how one person could look so good to her.

“Alert,” he had called her. She had spent so long tensed and afraid, she ached. Sometime during the long night hours she had moved to the rear of the cave, although she could not explain why. Now, though, she was not sure she could move. She feared she would do something mad—or humiliating—when and if she did.

What she ached to do was touch him, listen to his strong heartbeat, feel his warmth. That would still the fear that he had not really returned, that this was only a dream born of a terror-fevered mind. She was afraid, however, that she might take it too far. So, cowardly, she sat still.

“Now that I see this in the light,” Revan said, laughing as he sat before the fire and began to dismantle the large doll, “I dinna ken how it fooled them. Your clothes are dry now.”

“That is nice.”

“Do we have enough water for me to wash myself ?”

“Aye.”

Revan briefly frowned at her as he filled a large wooden bowl with water. She was behaving strangely, sitting in the dark and hardly speaking. Inwardly he shrugged as he yanked off his boots, then stripped to his hose. It must have been hard for her to wait, alone and in the dark, he decided as he began to wash the dust off himself. She probably just needed time to compose herself.

“They willna come looking for us here again,” he said in reassurance. “They will think we are miles away. I left many a false trail for them to puzzle over.”

“Good.”

Finished with his washing, he turned to stare at her. “Tess? Is something wrong?”

“Nay, nothing is wrong.”

“Ye are lying. Now”—he held out his hand—“come here into the light, where I can see you.”

She stared at him standing there, his broad smooth chest bared and his hand held out to her. It was a sight that broke what little control she had gained over herself. With a soft, inarticulate sound she raced toward him, flinging herself against him, her arms around his neck.

Startled and unbalanced by the sudden charge, Revan stumbled. He sat down, hard, on their bedding. Although he put his arms around her to keep her from tumbling, she showed no signs of awkwardness. Instead, she continued to cling to him, settling herself comfortably on his lap. He began to become far too aware of how good she felt in his arms, of how little she was wearing, and, even more dangerous, to recall how sweet it was to kiss her.

“Sweet Mary, I thought ye werena coming back,” she whispered in a rushed voice. “I thought they had murdered you. I began to see the wolves gnawing on your bones.”

“Wolves gnawing on my bones?” He laughed shakily.

“I dinna think I have ever been so scared in my whole life.”

“I had to leave you here alone.” Despite sternly telling himself not to do it, he slid his hands over her slim legs, finding her skin as silky and warm as he had imagined it would be.

“I wasna scared about that. Well, not much. ’Twas for you. I was scared for you. Ye were the one being hunted down.”

It occurred to her that she ought to slap his hands away. She might not know much, but she did know it was not proper to let him touch her legs as he was doing. Then she decided “proper” could go to perdition. The gentle stroking felt too good to put a stop to it.

“Well, as ye can clearly see, I have returned hale and hearty.”

Revan found clear speech a little difficult. It felt so good to touch her, he wanted to touch more of her. He could feel the shape of her small firm breasts against his chest. The way her shapely little backside pressed against his groin made him ache. If he did not get some distance between them soon, he would forget all the reasons why he should
not
touch her as he craved to.

“There are no cuts, no flesh wounds, no bruises . . . ?”

“Nay, not a scratch.”

He could feel her soft full mouth move against the side of his neck as she spoke. It increased his aching need to kiss her tenfold. When she shifted ever so slightly in his lap, rubbing her tempting derriere against him, he barely stifled a groan. Matters were getting completely out of hand. If he did not put a halt to this closeness, and soon, things would be past redemption.

“Well”—he inwardly cursed the husky unsteadiness of his voice, a condition worsened by the way she had begun to move her small hands over his back—“why dinna ye sit by the fire, and I will prepare us a meal.”

“I am sitting by the fire.”

The movement of her lips against the side of his neck was one time too many. Had he really felt her tongue briefly, tentatively, stroke his skin? Every desire he had tried to control during their sojourn in the cave was running wild.

“Dinna do it, Revan,” he muttered to himself even as he smoothed his hand over her thick unbound hair.

Leaning back just a little, Tess stared up at him. “Dinna do what?”

His eyes were a stormy gray, and the look they held stirred her blood as much as his hands. She placed her hands on his chest, lightly caressing its smooth, taut breadth. Beneath her hand she could feel the quickening of his heartbeat. He wanted her. It was a heady realization.

“Kiss you,” he whispered, his gaze falling to her full mouth. “Dinna kiss you.”

Despite her innocence, she knew he was hungering for far more than a kiss. If they did kiss, it would not stop there. She told herself what she was thinking was sinful. It was not right. It was not wise. It was simply asking for trouble and heartbreak. None of that mattered. She slowly ran her tongue over her lips and heard him inhale sharply. Seeing how she could affect him helped make her decision. It might be only passion, at least on his part, but instinct told her she would find none to equal it. She would take whatever was offered, take it now and worry about the future later. As her father had always told her to, she would follow her heart.

Slipping her arms about his neck, she brought his mouth close to hers. “Then mayhaps I will kiss you.”

“ ’Tis not a very wise plan.”

Since he was brushing light, nibbling kisses over her mouth, she did not take his protest seriously. “A tempting one.”

“Too tempting, curse it. Tess.” Her name escaped him as a soft groan when, as he ran his tongue over her lips, she lightly touched her tongue to his. “A kiss could be dangerous just now. ’Tis not the only thing I am thinking of. I want more.”

Sitting on his lap as she was, she was quite aware of that. She rubbed her bottom against him. He shuddered and she faintly echoed the reaction.

“Ye are playing with fire, lass.”

“I ken it—I feel the heat of it.”

“I am not a man for marrying, Tess.”

“I dinna believe I asked you.”

His brief startled laugh was unsteady. “Do ye ken what ye are headed for? I wasna jesting when I said I want more than a kiss.”

“How much more?” She continued to move against him, liking how it felt and how it so clearly made him feel.

“A great deal more. I want it all.”

He grasped her by her slim hips to halt her tormenting movements. There was a slight flush to her cheeks. Her beautiful eyes were heavy-lidded, the rich brown darkened nearly to black. Her breathing was as erratic as his, the pulse in her throat quickened. They were signs he knew how to read. Her passion was running as hot and mindless as his. It was his place, as the one with experience in such matters, to exercise a little restraint. Unfortunately, he did not possess an ounce of it.

“Tess,” he murmured, “I want to touch you. I want to taste every soft, sweet inch of you,” he whispered in a hoarse voice. “I want to bury myself deep inside you. I want it badly, so very badly. Have ye ever been with a man before?”

“Nay,” she managed to say, enflamed by his words.

“Well, lass, if ye dinna get far, far away from me—and fast—ye willna be able to say that come the dawn.”

She stared at him, briefly reviewing her decision. He had said he was not a marrying man. Becoming his lover was not apt to change that. All she could be sure of was his passion while with her body went her heart. It was not the best of situations, but she knew it would not change soon. To hesitate was to be lost, she told herself and brushed her lips across his.

“For a man who claims to want so much so very badly, ye are taking a fair long time in reaching for it.”

“Oh—curse it.”

Cupping the back of her head in his hands and burying his fingers deep in her soft hair, he held her mouth against his. Tess moaned softly as he kissed her. She opened her mouth quickly, eagerly, to his tongue. His kiss was one of barely restrained hunger, and she welcomed it, heartily returned it. When he moved, pressing her down onto the bedding so that she was sprawled on her back beneath him, she offered no resistance.

He shed the last of his clothes as she watched, wide-eyed. She had never seen a naked man before but decided he had to look as fine as any man could without clothes. Despite his blondness, his skin was all-over dark, even in the whitewashing effects of the firelight. A thin line of light hair began at his navel, went straight down to his groin, where it thickened as a cushion for his manhood, then thinned to a light coating over his strong, long legs.

When he laid down, she wrapped her arms about his neck. As he kissed her, he undid the shirt she wore. He propped himself up on one elbow to slowly remove her shirt, and she tensed. She was no Brenda, had no lush curves he could delight in. The longer he stared at her, the more nervous she grew, the more sure she was that the sight of her naked form had cooled his desire. Then he met her gaze. The passion she had read there before was still there but so much stronger. Such was the heat in his gaze she lost all doubt. He liked what he saw. It bred within her a feeling of pride and heady excitement. What embarrassment she had suffered quickly faded.

“Ye are finer than any of my imaginings.”

“Ye imagined me naked?” she whispered, shivering with delight when their flesh met as he settled himself in her arms.

Brushing light kisses over her face, he murmured, “Ever since I woke up to find this soft wee body curled up against me.”

What she planned to say was lost as he kissed her. When he cupped her breasts in his big hands, brushing his thumbs over the tips until they ached, she moaned softly and closed her eyes. The swirling caress of his tongue that followed made her squirm.

“Tessa,” he murmured against her breast. “Sweet Tessa, I never tasted any sweeter.”

She cried out, arching against him, when he slowly drew the swollen tip of her breast into his mouth. Burying her fingers into his thick hair, she held him close as he suckled. She trembled from the strength of the desire that rushed through her. Blindly she opened herself to his caresses, his kisses. So caught up in her passion was she, she barely flinched when his stroking hand slid down over the tight silken curls at the base of her abdomen and he began to stroke her intimately. She began to whisper his name, urgency filling each syllable, prompting her every touch.

Then, suddenly, he was crouched over her, urging her legs about his waist. She inhaled slowly as he began to join their bodies. The slow rocking motion he used was intoxicating. The breath escaped her in a startled rush as she felt a quick, sharp pain. He went very still. She could feel him staring down at her. Cautiously she chanced a peek at him from beneath her lashes.

“Tessa,” he whispered, “have I hurt you?”

“Nay, not truly.” She spoke as softly as he did, wondering if he shared her fear that speaking too loudly could ruin everything, could drag them back to reality and sensibility with a painful abruptness. “ ’Twas but a twinge.”

He touched his mouth to hers, easing his tongue between her lips. As be began to move his body, he mimicked the intimate strokes with his tongue. She clung to him as she caught his gentle rhythm, arching greedily as her passion mounted. With his arm beneath her hips he enhanced the close press of their bodies. As his movements grew fiercer, so did his kiss. Tess welcomed the change, craving the heightened intensity. When she was not sure she could bear any more, her whole body taut and painfully alive, she felt herself yanked into a blinding maelstrom of sensation. She heard herself cry out his name, heard his husky words of delight and encouragement, as she tried to take him with her. A moment later she heard him call out her name, felt him hold her tightly against him as he tensed and shuddered. Feeling exquisitely weak, she kept a limp grip on him as he collapsed in her arms.

The first clear thought Tess had was a sudden understanding of all the looks and smiles her parents had so often exchanged. This was what they had been thinking of, either remembering or anticipating it. Smoothing her hands over his broad warm back, she then pondered the loss of her maidenhead. It troubled her little. Even if all she was to know was this one sweet time with Revan, it was a small price to pay. She briefly, cynically, reminded herself that, with her fortune, she could always find a husband when and if she decided she wanted one.

She murmured a protest when he eased free of her hold, lazily watching him from beneath her lashes. He moved to wash himself off, rinsed the rag out, then returned to her side. When he proceeded to clean her off, she blushed over the intimate service and closed her eyes. The moment he laid down at her side again, she returned to his arms but sensed a tension in him that made her frown.