Once A Wolf (9 page)

of him into the ruined house, snatching up one of the blankets as she passed. She laid it in the

corner farthest from his. Her clothing was no better fitted for crouching than riding, but she

managed to make a pillow of sorts and sat down as rigidly as if she'd been in a hard-backed

chair.

Tomás made himself comfortable and used his knife to cut off a wedge of cheese. "And to think

I went to the trouble of getting all this for you," he said, gesturing to the bread and

strawberries.

"I'm very sorry. What do you usually dine on—raw meat?" His night vision could just make out

the flush that rose to her cheeks the moment she finished speaking.

He examined a juicy strawberry. "I am a wolf. Perhaps you identify with another kind of animal.

Shakespeare wrote about such a creature in one of his plays. In Spanish, we call it La Fierecilla

Domada. You would call it The Taming of the Shrew."

Her blush deepened. "An outlaw who knows Shakespeare," she said. "I am duly impressed."

"I know many things," he said. And I believe I may come to know you well, my Lady of Ice,

before our acquaintance is finished. "In answer to your question, my men and I are usually

content with tortillas, frijoles—beans, to you—and chiles." He popped the strawberry into his

mouth. "Are you quite sure you are not hungry?"

She turned her face away and began to shove her hair about, attempting to untangle the

knotted strands with her fingers. Tomás sighed and went in search of her saddlebags. She

looked at him warily when he dropped the bags beside her.

"I have never known a woman to be without a hairbrush," he said, untying the flaps. Rowena

made a halfhearted bid to snatch the bags away, but not before he found what he was seeking

amid the folds of cloth and female gewgaws. "Ah." He examined the handsome brush with a

practiced eye. "Expensive."

"Do you care to calculate the worth of the few belongings you've left me?" she said. "Perhaps

you intend to sell them as you plan to sell me?"

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He raised his hands, palm out. "Paz, Lady Rowena. It is true that such a thing might feed a

village family for a week, but I will not take it from you. And if selling you were my intention, I'd

find you a far better master than MacLean." He presented the brush with a little bow and

backed away.

Her thanks was hardly effusive; he might have mistaken it for a curse. Golden hair made a

screen about her face as she went to work. Tomás chewed a piece of bread and observed her

struggle, almost moved to pity. After a handful of minutes she partially reemerged, eyes

glittering with something very like savagery.

"You wished to learn of ladies?" she said between her teeth. "Here is your first lesson. There is

a reason we keep our hair up when we ride."

"So I see. Lo siento; I am sorry. It was just too great a temptation to resist."

"And of course you never resist temptation."

"As seldom as possible." Once again he wondered if she realized how provocative her banter

sounded. It frankly surprised him, for it was not what he remembered of her in England. She

had not behaved so when she'd thought him a gentleman of her own class and country.

A man like Cole MacLean would not tolerate such boldness in his woman. He'd regard her as an

inferior, like every other creature on the earth—his property, made to defer to him in all things.

No, she could not have spoken so to Cole. Nor would he have suspected she wished to.

Either she simply considered Tomás too far beneath her to watch her tongue, or it was all the

defense of a woman who was too proud to acknowledge fear or disadvantage, even to herself.

She spoke of temptation. Was she tempting, caught up in a battle with her own fair tresses, all

but spitting with frustration? Por Dios, she was.

He got up again and walked toward her. She drew back.

"It might be easier if you had help," he said, crouching beside her.

" From you?" she asked with a lilt of incredulity.

"I often brushed my mother's hair when I was a boy. Hers was very thick and black, and it was

beautiful, like yours."

An odd, almost wistful expression crossed her face, as if she had never considered that he

might have a mother. "She must grieve over the life you lead."

"My mother is dead," he said, and shrugged. "Long ago. But some things one doesn't forget."

He pulled the brush from her hand and caught up a lock of her hair. Tension sang through the

strands. She jerked back.

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"If you move, you may cause yourself discomfort," he said. "This will go much faster if you

cooperate." He began to stroke, barely touching, the way he would groom a half-wild horse.

Strange to think that such a one as this needed gentling. She regarded herself as a fine and

proper lady—yet wouldn't a lady flutter and faint in the hands of an outlaw? She would not be

a wolf, but her spirit was too strong to remain in the cage she had designed to hold it.

Or had Cole fashioned that cage himself?

He finished with one small section of her hair and gathered up another. Each strand was

delicate, touched with lighter and darker hues. It seemed to slide through his hands as if it had

a life of its own.

And Rowena didn't stir. He could not have said why she chose to surrender. It was, at best, a

reluctant capitulation. Perhaps this restrained sensuality was one of the few such indulgences

she permitted herself.

But her gaze never left his face, and with each stroke of the brush he felt a corresponding tug in

his own body, an increasing desire to bury his hands in the quiescent flame of her hair.

It was seldom that he pondered deeply on his own thoughts. He was a man of action, not

reflection. He'd assumed on the train that his plans for his captive would be more work than

pleasure—except the pleasure of trampling the MacLeans' nonexistent honor. His Lady of Fire

was just idle fantasy.

He was beginning to change his mind.

Lady Rowena did not behave like a shrinking virgin. For an instant he entertained the thought of

her lying naked in MacLeans arms; he remembered the moment on the train when he'd

envisioned MacLean kissing her, and his bizarre reaction of possessive rage.

He could feel it starting again. Ridiculo; she could not have lain with a man before marriage. Not

as she was in New York, or in England. Not his Lady of Ice. You.

Her voice brought him sharply back to himself. He let her hair fall. She swept it behind her

shoulders and gave him a frown that would have made any lesser man tremble.

"I know you," she said. "I am sure of it now. We met before you ever came to New York." She

stood up. "Who are you?"

He'd known the time must come when she would recognize him, if ever she acknowledged

even a fraction of her werewolf senses. He rose to face her.

"I have been many men, señorita."

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"In England," she said. "You were there. At Greyburn." Her face transformed with memory.

"The Spaniard—"

"Don Alarico Julian Del Fiero, also at your service."

"What a fool I've been," she whispered. "Braden wrote to tell me that the man who claimed to

be Del Fiero—you—" She shook her head. "The real Del Fiero wrote to Braden months after the

Convocation. He never made it to England. Something prevented him—someone." Her eyes

sharpened with accusation. "You took his place!"

"You have unmasked me, my lady."

"You helped Braden fight the Boroskovs, and disappeared. Now I see why you know so much

about me. But… Braden knew nothing of your family. He was searching for loups-garous all over

the world. You could have come openly, but instead you chose to hide—"

"You wonder why, Rowena? It was because of you."

She felt for the wall behind her. "I don't believe you. We never met—"

"But I knew of you, my lady. I knew you were destined to be Cole MacLean's bride, as arranged

by your brother the earl. How ironic that you fled that marriage only to accept it three years

later."

The color drained from her face. "Cole. Of course." She paced away from the wall and turned

back, fists balled at her sides. "You hate the MacLeans enough to travel all the way to England…

to interfere with Cole's marriage?"

"Bravo, my lady. Your mind is as quick as your tongue. I've watched the MacLeans for years—

and I knew how ambitious he was to increase his position and fortune with a bride of such great

family. Since it's my pleasure to frustrate Cole MacLeans ambitions, it was essential that I learn

all that I could about Lady Rowena Forster."

Her chin jerked up. "And what did you learn?"

"That you were a proud and stubborn lady. That you despised the thought of marrying another

of your kind. That you wished to be merely human, and that you would do almost anything to

attain that wish."

Rowena's discomfort was manifest. Her normally frank gaze avoided him entirely. "You did not

even speak to me."

"There was no need. I observed. I saw that there was little chance you'd willingly be MacLean's

bride. I found it necessary to leave England following the battle with the Russians, but I learned

soon after that you had disappeared, before your would-be mate ever arrived to claim you."

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"Did you also prevent Cole from coming to England?" Her words held the bite of sarcasm, but

his silence wiped the mockery from her face. "Braden told me later that he telegraphed to

apologize… a sudden family crisis—"

"For which you should thank me, my lady. His 'crisis' gave you the time you needed to escape

your fate. Unfortunate that you didn't follow your original plan to avoid him; it would have

saved us both much trouble. But you were in a foreign country, and alone, when he found you.

He made you believe that he could give you the kind of life you want. Is that not so?"

"He was not what I feared when my brother arranged our marriage. It was my choice to accept

his proposal."

"And that is why you are here tonight, Rowena. I could not permit MacLean's scheme to

succeed."

"Then this feud between you is worse than I imagined. It is an obsession, madness—"

"There is a certain satisfaction in madness. But you've never allowed yourself to discover that,

have you?"

"I saw what it did to my elder brother, with his great 'Cause' of saving the werewolf race. At

least he had a noble motive. But you—"

"You know nothing of me, señorita." He moved closer. "That could be remedied."

"You wish to explain to me why your cowardly act against my fiancé is justified. You wish to win

my sympathy and cooperation. I have no interest in the lies of a thief and kidnapper."

"And killer. Don't forget that."

She flinched almost imperceptibly. "I do not see your gun. Don't all outlaws carry guns?"

"I've never much liked them. I prefer the use of other methods—"

"To murder? How many men have you killed, Mr. Randall?"

"I thought you were uninterested in my story." He shrugged. "If MacLean redeems you, you can

ask him. Sin duda, he'll tell you the unvarnished truth."

"You truly have no shame at all."

"Why should I? I am not like you, Rowena, afraid of half of myself."

He knew it was the one subject she could not face calmly, no matter how much she tried to

dismiss it. He saw the repressed panic in her eyes, panic she fought with the very spirit she

wished to forswear.

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As if she could.

"I am not afraid of myself—and certainly not of you," she snapped.

"Muy bien. Then I suggest you eat and then rest. We have a long ride tomorrow." He went back

for the food and wrapped it in a napkin. "Permit me to attend you, my lady. I did steal you away

from your servants. Can a lady feed herself?"

In answer she picked up the bread, took it in both hands, and awkwardly tore off a piece.

Delicately she nibbled on one end, though it was clear to him that she was hungrier than she'd

ever admit. She examined a strawberry and ate it in several bites. She reached for the knife

he'd left beside the cheese.

Her hand shook as she pointed the blade in his direction.

"Stay away," she said. She scrambled to her feet, the weapon clumsy in her fist. "I'm going out

to get a horse. Don't follow me—"

Tomás closed the distance between them in two steps and covered her hands with his. The

knifes point made a crease in his shirt.

"I believe I would follow you anywhere," he said. He worked her rigid fingers open and eased

the knife from her grip. "And I would be devastated if you hurt yourself, mi rubia."

For a moment he saw the fierce battle within her, swirling like tiny golden sparks in her eyes.