The Crimson Lady (15 page)

He scowled, clenching his fist over the miniature of his former betrothed, the tiny, gilt-framed painting of Julia that he’d taken from his belongings earlier that day. He’d been aware of its weight and mocking presence at his side all evening—had brought it along with him for that purpose, to remind himself of what it was he wanted in his life when all this insanity was over.

Of the kind of woman he would need to reestablish his honorable existence and place in society once Elizabeth was saved, Richard secured, and Draven dealt with.

But it hadn’t helped, because no matter how many times he looked at the exquisite portrait, or tried to recall the impeccable qualities of the woman it represented, his mind kept drifting to another face. To an image of a woman with tawny eyes and auburn hair, whose demeanor revealed a capacity for passion layered beneath with a quiet sense of dignity and honor.

To Fiona.

He’d realized today that he didn’t really want Julia, or even any woman like her. He wanted
Fiona
. He wanted her in every way a man could want a woman, in a way that went beyond physical desire, enticing as she was. He’d tried to fool himself into believing it was simple lust for long enough. It was more than that; he knew it now. He yearned to taste something deeper with her, a giving of soul that a mere joining of bodies could not hope to imitate.

And it had made him damn angry to realize it.

He’d tried to argue himself out of it, wanted more than anything to resist what he was feeling, but he couldn’t. After escaping Chepston Hall, he’d initiated his plan to track down the Crimson Lady and coerce her to help him with his eyes wide open, knowing full well that she was a notorious courtesan and thief; he’d been prepared to use her for what he needed, then let her go to resume her sordid activities at will. But his assumptions had been proved false. Again and again, she’d turned his world upside down, rattling his beliefs of what she would be with the humbling reality of who she was.

He’d come to appreciate things about her that he’d never thought possible, to recognize attributes that he’d never dreamed a woman of her history could possess. But they were there. Shadowed past or not, Fiona was a giving, caring woman, full of tender feelings, hopes, and fears, and he wanted her more with every breath he drew. Running off and riding the wind on his steed hadn’t changed that fact one bit.

It was quite a dilemma…one that he had no idea for resolving, except in the fantasy of his own thoughts—for how could he reconcile what he wanted with who he was—the kind of man he’d been his entire life and hoped to be again? Deep down, he didn’t believe himself an outlaw any more than Fiona was the noblewoman she sometimes played. He was the son of a crown justice, doing all that he could to regain his status of respect—the inheritor to a way of life that was in direct opposition to the one from which she came. And yet…and yet…

Making a sound of disgust and shoving the miniature
into the fold of his cape, Braedan shook his head, setting out to find the object of his tortured thoughts. It was too much to worry about right now. He didn’t need to make those kinds of decisions yet; first he had to do what had brought him to Fiona in the first place and rescue Elizabeth. Helping his brother and bringing Draven to justice would come next. The rest would have to work itself out in its own time, for good or for ill.

Pushing aside the flap to their tree shelter, he ducked in and let his eyes adjust to the moonless interior. The mounded forms at the back of the hollow showed that Will and Joan were already at rest, but the pallet he and Fiona shared was empty. She was with Nate, then. He should have expected as much, knowing her as he did; she’d not be sleeping easy and far from the lad’s side until he was past the worst with his wounds.

Tossing his cloak onto their pallet, Braedan left their abode again and headed for the shelter where the ill and infirm were housed at the settlement’s edge. A fire glowed just in front of the roughly constructed lean-to, and as he approached he could tell that though a few flames flickered on the surface, it had burnt down mostly to coals. The light from the fire was brighter than the moon’s glow, however, and he saw that Nate was stretched out on a pallet of blankets within the shelter, while a woman sat hunched before the low-burning blaze.
Fiona
.

He held back for a moment, suppressing the surge of gladness that went through him at the sight of her. She was beautiful, even wrapped in a coarse-spun blanket against the night air. As Braedan watched, she got up from her position at the fire to check Nate’s bandage, feeling his brow and adjusting the coverlet over his still form before returning to her vigil at fireside. The boy
seemed to be asleep, though his face was flushed and his breathing shallow. He wasn’t in the clear yet, it seemed, his body still fighting the wound.

Braedan’s mouth tightened at the memory of Nate’s suffering, and he resumed his approach; Fiona turned upon hearing him, making a motion for quiet. He completed the distance in silence and sat down next to her near some overturned logs round the fire, noticing that several others, including old Grady, were spread out asleep on pallets all around. When he’d gotten himself settled, he asked quietly of her, “How fares the lad, then?”

“As well as can be expected.” She took a twig she’d been spinning in her fingers and tossed it into the coals before glancing over at Nate again.

“He looks feverish.”

“He is, still. It began a few hours before sundown, but it seems to have lessened a bit this past hour. And his pain has faded enough with the herbs I gave him that he no longer moans in his sleep.”

Braedan nodded, relief mingling with the strange satisfaction he felt at being near to her again. He’d missed her.
Even for those few hours,
he realized. The idea of it baffled him. He’d never felt so about anyone before, most especially not a woman. But it was there now, undeniable, the gnawing ache that had crept in when he was gone somehow soothed by her nearness.

As if she’d read his thoughts, she glanced over at him, hesitating before she murmured, “I—I am glad that you’re back, Braedan. I was beginning to worry, wondering what might have kept you so long.”

Warmth slid through him at that, but he looked away, not wanting her to see the power her words had over him. Clearing his throat, he answered, “I told you I
would return, lady; you needn’t have feared—and I am here now as always, at your service.”

“That is not what I meant, Braedan.” The enigmatic quality of her voice pulled his gaze to her again. “It is not because of what you can do for me that I am glad you’ve returned. I just wanted you to know that I—” She stopped, picking another twig from the pile of branches stacked nearby and fiddling with it as if considering whether or not she would complete her thoughts aloud. At last she added more quietly, “I suppose it is just that I feel more at peace when you’re here, and I wanted you to know. I do not understand why that is, and it is likely illogical to feel so, but—”

“I do not find it illogical, lady,” Braedan answered, his voice low. She met his gaze again then, a fleeting look, and even in the fire’s dying light he could see the faint blush spread over her cheeks. With a self-conscious smile, she ducked her head and looked away again, but he wasn’t ready to abandon their conversation yet. “You’ve been awake overlong. Why don’t you stretch out on one of the pallets for a bit? I’ll take the remainder of the watch for you.”

“Nay, I cannot.” She shook her head, looking at Nate again. “You wouldn’t know what to do if he becomes feverish again.”

It was a good argument, Braedan conceded, but it wasn’t going to achieve the sleep he knew she needed. Without saying more, he slid behind her, tugging her back against his chest.

She protested at first, but after a while she eased into his embrace with a grateful sigh; the rightness of it settled over him, and he cradled her close with his hands linked around her waist. Peaceful quiet fell around them,
and his breathing slowed, the moment overtaking his senses. It was wonderful, holding her like this. It astonished him, the way that something so simple could be so satisfying. Moving in slowly, to more fully enjoy the sensation of her in his arms, Braedan brushed a kiss over the delicate skin of her temple, stilling afterward to stare into the flickering coals with her.

“This is much better, don’t you think?” he murmured in her ear.

“Aye, much.” She sighed again, and he could feel her relaxing in his arms, her fingers stroking the backs of his hands in an intoxicating pattern.

“Rest now. I don’t want you taking ill yourself from too little sleep,” he added, closing his eyes at the wonderful sensations she was causing with her touch.

“It is of no matter, really. I have stayed awake until dawn many times before.”

Braedan couldn’t stop his instinctive stiffening at her answer, his mind latching on to thoughts of her past and the reasons she might have had for going without sleep in the years before he knew her. Her fingers stilled in response to his reaction. But in the next instant he realized that he didn’t care if her work as the Crimson Lady was what she meant; it was part of long ago, something she couldn’t change. Perhaps she didn’t want it changed—it mattered little to him. He saw her for what she was to him, and that was enough for now. Tugging her back more firmly against him, he said, “You should close your eyes while you have a chance, then. I will wake you if Nate seems worse.”

“Nay, I will sit here with you, but I do not think I should close my—”

“Sleep, Fiona,” he said more firmly, kissing her cheek
and shifting to make her lean back more comfortably into him. “I will wake you if you’re needed, I promise.”

After a moment more, she pulled his arms closer around her, nodding and snuggling into his embrace. She’d hardly exhaled again, managing to mumble a sleepy “Thank you,” before she was asleep.

Smiling, Braedan held still and soaked in the moment, reveling in the feelings coursing through him, the pleasure it gave him to do something for her for once—he who from their first hour together had by necessity done nothing but take. It was a welcome change, assuaging some of the guilt he’d been experiencing ever since he’d walked into her shop and coerced her into helping him. But it was something more, too. Even with their divergent paths in life—she the courtesan and he the son of a crown justice—it was right somehow, he realized. Having her in his arms like this was another small gift to savor.

Settling back against the log behind him, Braedan breathed in the faint, sweet fragrance of Fiona’s hair blended with night air and the drifting smoke from the fire, relishing the warm weight of her against him….

And quieting, with the simple act of holding her, some of the bitterness that had long been churning in his soul.

F
iona eyed the handful of coins and the single silver ring that Will was adding to the sack of their day’s take thus far. It had been a less than successful morning, the marks they’d been forced to choose being lone riders or pairs only, but a few coaches or litters having passed by, and those too well guarded for Will to order a confrontation. The weather hadn’t helped either. An early-summer shower threatened to unleash from the skies at any moment, the darkening clouds and stirring winds only adding to the feelings of frustration among the group, who at the moment were standing nearly a hundred feet off the road in a pocket of leafy, concealing trees.

“I say we split up—half of us to Yardley Cross, over the hill, and the others to stay here,” Tom Thatcher groused. “At least we might be able to collect double the pittance we’ve been gettin’ so far here today.”

“We’re already thin in numbers with Grady and Nate back at the settlement,” Will answered, tossing the sack of plunder to Rufus. “We shouldn’t divide further. Besides, Tucker Tilton’s gang takes the area near Yardley Cross; we can’t afford to set him off against us again by steppin’ into his boundaries.”

“Then at least let us take a coach or two, Will!” the man argued.

“Nay—not unless the odds are right.”

“With Tom, me, and Jepthas we’ve got a total of six men and Giselle here now,” Henry Fisk offered. “That’s more than you had when you took the pardoner’s purse two weeks ago.”

“Aye, but there were only two guards and the coachman then—and even so we were lucky it worked as well as it did.”

“But we can do it, Will!” Tom said. “Let’s just take a rich coach or two and be done with it for the day, before the rain turns the road to mud and stops the travelers from comin’ by.”

Will remained silent, his weight on one leg and his fist against his hip, looking around the group. Fiona knew the risks her brother was considering—and knew also how much he had hoped for a few profitable takes that day to continue their luck of the previous week, how much he wished to provide some security for his band of outlaws, who had suffered too long under the gnawing bite of hunger this past winter. His gaze settled on Braedan, who was standing next to her with his arms folded across his chest. She glanced at the man who had been occupying her thoughts so completely as well, sensing his answering disappointment in this day, and know
ing before he spoke what his answer would be to the question Will asked him next.

“Well, what’s your opinion on this de Cantor? Are you for trying to take another coach?”

Braedan nodded. “If it is meet with the rest of you, I’m for it.”

“Then we’ll scout the next to come through. The road branches off not far before us, though, so we will need two men as runners to spot from either direction. It should be a coach that looks to be rich but not overly guarded.”

“I’ll go!” all five men said nearly simultaneously, and Will’s mouth quirked on one side as he shook his head.

“I suppose I should be grateful for the enthusiasm, but we have to divide the tasks. Jepthas and Tom can go, and the rest of us will stay here to set up the ruse. Without Nate, we cannot enact the stranded noblewoman, and yet a coach will not stop to aid a simple peasant,” Will said, indicating the plain attire they’d had Fiona wear for the morning’s work thus far. “Giselle will have to change into the fustian kirtle and circlet we brought and ready herself to play the part of a noblewoman beset by outlaws—” he grinned fully this time, his blue eyes sparkling, “—my favorite of our ploys, I confess.”

Braedan frowned, glancing at her. “I never said I was willing to put her in harm’s way. This sounds more dangerous than other parts she’s played.”

“Oh, don’t worry, man, it is only a pretense,” Will broke in, drawing Braedan’s attention again. “She won’t be hurt. She might be your wife, but she’s my sister as well, remember? This ploy just tweaks my humor, is all. We get to enact that which we already are, and in doing so, we catch a purse from the kind of person who usually
overlooks the rape, robbery, or attack of women who cannot claim noble blood and title. Call it playin’ to my fine sense of justice if you will,” her brother added, winking at Braedan.

Braedan continued to frown, turning to her and asking quietly, “Are you comfortable with this, lady? I wish to hear your thoughts on it before I’ll agree to take part.”

“It is fine, Braedan,” Fiona answered, flushing as she caught her brother’s eye-rolling bemusement. “Quite safe, really. I’ve done it many times before.” She glanced up at him, then, the swell of strange feeling inside her at his concern making her cheeks feel even warmer. “If you’d feel better about it, you can play the man who has me in his grip. That way you’ll know I am safe.”

“I’m not sure I could make an attack on you look convincing.”

“Aye, it would more likely seem a lover’s embrace, if all this mooning is any indication,” Will drawled, sauntering forward. “You’d better let me take that part, sister.” He swiveled his head to Braedan. “You can trust me to keep her safe in it, can’t you, de Cantor? I know what to do to make it look real without harmin’ a hair on her precious head.”

Braedan still didn’t look happy about it, but at last he gave a jerking nod, and they all dispersed to get ready for their respective parts. Soon Fiona was ready, having changed, in the privacy of the wood, into the dark blue kirtle Will had brought with them, belting it with a gold braid. All that remained was the circlet, and so she unbound her plaited hair and started to slide it in place.

“Here, let me help.”

Braedan’s low voice caressed her even as his hands
deftly adjusted the mass of her tresses around the circlet to help secure it.

“Thank you,” she murmured, still feeling the tingling pleasure from his touch even when he’d finished assisting her. She turned to face him, then, her breath catching at the look in his eyes. She glanced down, her senses rising to meet the heat smoldering in his gaze.

“You look beautiful, Fiona,” he said, never breaking his stare.

“It is but borrowed finery—all a part of the role that I play,” she answered lightly, trying to distance herself from the turbulent emotions his nearness was causing her. She smiled and began to move past him to make her way to their roadside position.

He took her arm, gently tugging her to a halt and making her look at him. She swallowed and felt her mouth go dry. He held her mesmerized, and she knew she’d have been still before him whether or not his touch on her arm restrained her.

“It is no role, this beauty of yours, lady,” he said, his voice husky. “It comes from deep within you, something you cannot disguise or change. In truth you seemed as attractive in your peasant garments as now. Even when you hid yourself under the bulky pads and widow’s weeds when I first met you, I could see the light that shone from inside. It was why I continued to pursue an answer from you, even though by outward appearances you couldn’t have been the temptress I sought.”

“So you consider me a temptress, then?” she asked, looking away, trying to mask the inexplicable hurt prompting that question.

“Nay.” He lifted his hand to cup her jaw tenderly, bringing her back to meet his gaze. His blue eyes were so
serious, so calm that she knew without a doubt that what he was saying was nothing less than the truth to him. “You’re not at all what I first thought you would be—not what I’d led myself to expect in the Crimson Lady. Whatever your past, whatever you’ve had to do up until now, you are not she, Fiona. And yet you do tempt me. Like no other woman I’ve ever known, you tempt me.”

She felt speechless for the feelings sweeping through her at his declaration. She’d never known the like of him before either. Braedan de Cantor seemed as different from other men as the moon was from the stars, and she was still struggling to accept that truth, to be able to acknowledge it in her heart, where the danger of letting go and believing was so great. More than anything she wanted to be able to say it, to make her words match her feelings, but it was still too frightening, and she still felt too vulnerable to give voice to her deepest thoughts.

He tilted his head down to brush a kiss across her lips. When he pulled back, a slight frown marred his brow. “We haven’t much time left before we’ll need to be ready for Will’s call. You must promise me to be careful, Fiona. The whole idea of this ruse sits badly with me.”

“I will be fine. Will and I have enacted this dozens of times. Besides, I am not the one who will be wielding a sword and demanding payment. It is you who needs be careful.”

“Only if you promise the same.”

“Aye,” she nodded. “I promise.”

“It’s settled then.” He leaned in for one last kiss just as Will strode toward them, calling in a loud whisper that they were ready to go. Tom had run back a moment
ago with news of a coach approaching on the path from London, and he, Jepthas, and Rufus had already taken their positions, hidden in the overgrown, leafy cover along the roadside near Fiona’s mount. All that remained was positioning Braedan, placing Fiona so that those in the coach could get good view of the “attack” Will would perpetrate on her, and arranging Henry at the roadside as if he’d been knocked senseless so as to be unable to aid his lady.

They achieved their poses just before the coach came into sight. Quickly, Will pulled Fiona’s arm as if he were dragging her away from her mount, then twisted her around in his grip so that her hands were behind her, slamming her back against his chest so forcefully that it knocked the wind from her. As he lifted his dagger to her throat, thumb beneath the edge to prevent her from being cut, she hissed in her breath. “Saints, Will, go a little easier, will you? I’d rather not be bruised when we’re done.”

“Sorry, love,” he murmured, before growling more loudly, for the benefit of the approaching coach, “I’ll be takin’ what jewels I like, milady—and samplin’ anythin’ else that strikes me fancy, too!”

With that cue, Fiona let go a shriek, crying out for help as she began to struggle in his arms. From the corner of her gaze, she saw the coach slow a bit; it was a plain but large and finely made vehicle, a covered carriage of darkened wood, polished until it gleamed. Two coachmen rode in front, and there were two other riders at the back. A shock of surprise shot through her at the sight of them. Tom had risked much in calling a mark on this one; there were too many men—almost an even number to the outlaws, and that if only one person was
concealed behind the heavy draperies that kept the interior of the coach from sight.

She felt Will’s arm tighten with what she knew had to be the same concern she was feeling, but she continued to struggle, enacting their ruse even as she caught the faint movement of the draperies on one side. Two loud thumps resounded from inside the coach, and of a sudden the drivers pulled up to a stop a few feet away from them. Not a word was spoken. But in the next instant the foreboding she’d experienced bloomed into pure terror as the doors at the back of the coach burst open and four more armed men hurtled out, wearing the colors of the king’s soldiers, to join the coachmen and the two at the back in charging at her and Will with their blades drawn.

And then chaos erupted.

Fiona’s mind whirled with the shock of what was happening as Braedan and the rest of their group leapt from hiding to help fend off the unexpected attack. Will was forced to push her aside in order to meet the slashing thrust of one of the unknown men, but in her surprise she was slow to reach for her own dagger, and in what seemed less than a heartbeat a soldier was upon her, gripping her wrists and twisting her hands up and behind her; he secured her in a position that was ironically much the same as the one Will had feigned with her only moments ago—only this time the blade that was held to her throat bit all too sharply into her skin.

With that cold metal pressed to her and her arms yanked painfully up her back, she was dragged a little away from the fighting, closer to the carriage itself, and though she fought and twisted as hard as she could, she achieved nothing but the burning pain of her wrenched
shoulders and the sting of the dagger’s edge at her neck. Soon the man had hauled her around behind the coach, so that she was blocked from sight of Braedan and the others.

“Cease now, woman,” the soldier growled low in her ear, giving her a brutal shake as he uttered the directive. “It will go worse for you if you fight.” Fiona felt her breath coming hard and fast, but she continued to struggle against his gauntlet-covered hands and steely grip, unwilling to give up.

With a sound of exasperation, the man jerked the blade up, digging it beneath her jaw, and she froze, unable to stop herself then from obeying him in the face of the brutal death that had suddenly become her only other option. She stood there, completely still, her neck arched at a painful angle by the blade that was forcing her almost up on her toes, unable to see anything but the unyielding wooden panels of the coach. In a few moments the noise of fighting and the clashing of swords began to lessen around them, fading into groans and some rustling sounds.

A bolt of fear shot through Fiona. Unable to turn her head, she moved her eyes instead, gazing around wildly, trying to see something,
anything
—but it was useless. Her captor seemed patient in his stillness, holding her rigidly as if he was waiting for something more to come. Then suddenly, the area went completely silent. There was nothing—no sound of any voice she recognized, and her heart sank, swirling with the fear she refused to allow herself to feel when she thought of what might have happened on the other side of that coach. She prayed to God that Will, Braedan, and the others were all right, and that the hush didn’t mean that they were dead.

The fact that she herself hadn’t been killed yet likely meant one thing, she knew; nausea churned in her belly as she steeled herself for what was sure to come, unable to stop from wondering if her captor was waiting for the others to join him before they would take her in a mob, or if they planned to force themselves on her, one at a time, in relative privacy.

She was readying herself to make one last attempt for freedom, when a string of curses suddenly echoed through the silence. She stopped breathing to listen, and the curse came again, followed by the same voice calling out her name. Her heart leapt. It was Braedan.