Thief of Hearts (11 page)

Brodie shouted a blasphemous curse and lunged. "Let her go!" The robber aimed the gun at his head and cocked it, grinning a gap-toothed grin, black eyes inviting. Brodie halted, fists clenched, knees flexed. "Shoot him," he grated through his teeth. "God damn it, O'Dunne,
shoot him
."

The bandit backed up, one arm across Anna's chest, pulling her with him toward his horse. Her knees were buckling and she was afraid she couldn't obey when he ordered her into the saddle. He shoved her up roughly with a hand on her rump, then jumped up behind her and turned the horse.

O'Dunne wasn't going to shoot. In fury and disbelief, Brodie saw that there was one last chance. He sprang at the trotting horse, intending to grab the bandit's boot and unseat him. But Paulo saw, swung his gun, and fired. Brodie felt a fiery slash along his cheekbone and the side of his ear, and kept coming.

Anna screamed. The bandit fired again, but this time the gun only clicked. He jabbed his heels into the horse's sides and it bolted forward, smacking Brodie broadside in the head and chest and knocking him over backwards. Anna shrieked again, sure they were trampling him. Paulo hauled on the reins to turn the rearing horse and galloped into the trees.

Brodie staggered up, holding his side, wondering if his ribs were broken. O'Dunne hurried over to help him, but he shook him off. "Give me the gun," Brodie snarled.

"I can't, you—"

"Give it to me!" He seized him by the lapels and shook him. They stared at each other for long seconds, and then Brodie let go.

O'Dunne reached into his inside coat pocket and extracted the pistol.

Brodie swore foully. "You call this a gun?" A four-shooter, and he wasn't a very good shot. He pocketed it, though, and set off toward the horses that were tethered out of sight in the woods.

"What are you going to do?" The lawyer wrung his hands, watching as Brodie untied the biggest horse.

He surveyed the bridleless, saddleless animal. He'd been on horseback twice in his life, both times when he was a child. He led the horse to a rock and mounted it. "Get up on one of these and ride until you find somebody who can help us. Bring 'em back here and then follow our tracks. I'm going after Mrs. Balfour." O'Dunne just stared. "Do it!" he shouted, kicking the animal's sides and yanking on its mane to turn it, shoving O'Dunne out of the way in the process. Before he crashed into the wet underbrush, he looked back to see Alden leading another horse over to the rock.

Following the hilly trail was easy; the sodden ground was pockmarked with hoofprints. He could even tell which horse Anna rode with Paulo because the indentations were deeper. The woods were thick, but he was on a path of sorts. Smaller ones ran across it at intervals, but the prints kept going straight. The hard part was keeping the damn horse on the trail with no bridle or stirrups. He leaned forward and held the animal's head straight with two hands on the halter to go forward, hauling on it to make it turn right or left. His progress was agonizingly slow, and it ate away at his nerves. He concentrated on forward movement to avoid thinking of what might be happening to her, now. Muttering curses out loud, he wiped the bloody rain from his face, barely aware of the icy burn from the bullet graze across his cheek.

He guessed he had gone about four miles when the woods began to thin out toward a flat, grassy plain. The prints disappeared, and he felt a rush of panic before spotting them again up ahead. They seemed to head straight across the meadow to the opposite forest, which ended abruptly at the foot of a low, craggy hill. He set out at a fast trot, zigzagging across the plain, swearing vilely at the horse as he bumped up and down, graceless but determined.

Three-quarters of the way across, he saw a cottage at the base of the hill, almost hidden in trees, three horses tied up outside. He jumped from his own horse, turned it around and gave it a hard slap, then dropped to the wet ground on all fours. Crawling, he made it to a low thicket within a hundred feet of the cottage and peered around, listening. A trickle of smoke drifted from the chimney. The horses were still saddled, and the implication of that froze his blood. He pulled Aiden's gun out of his belt and checked it. On a deep breath, he darted across open space to a cover of crumbling stone wall, pausing there again until he heard it. Anna's shrill "No!"

Forgetting caution, he made a wild dash for the cottage. Twenty feet away, he saw a man in the doorway. Without breaking stride, he aimed and fired. The man dropped. Brodie kept running, over him, through the door. He saw Anna huddled in the corner of the single room, her clothes strewn everywhere. To his left a gun fired; the bullet smashed into the wall behind him, splintering it. He whirled and shot, twice, and the second man fell. The third—Paulo was scrabbling in the pockets of his discarded jacket, frantically searching for his pistol. Teeth bared, Brodie cocked, aimed, and waited. Paulo found his gun, turned and crumpled as Brodie's bullet smacked into the center of his chest.

Brodie threw the empty pistol down and moved toward Anna, slowly, not wanting to frighten her, but hoping she wouldn't faint before he could get to her. She looked white enough for it. The bastards had gotten her down to her underwear, and he cursed their souls to hell, feeling a dark, primitive gladness that he'd killed them. "You're all right now," he said, just before he wrapped her in his arms.

She felt his warmth, the generosity of his body, and began to shake uncontrollably. Her throat worked as she swallowed down bitter tears and held both fists over her chest, pressing hard to relieve the deep pressure in her heart. The trembling worsened, and suddenly her knees gave way. Brodie's arms tightened warmly, holding her closer.

When he realized she really couldn't stand, he scooped her up and carried her to the chair in front of the just-kindled fire. He meant to seat her in it, but her slender arms flexed in protest and she wouldn't let go of his neck. So he sat down himself, with her on his lap. He pushed close to the fire to warm her feet and legs and chafed her bare upper arm, holding her tightly. The smallness and warmth of her helped to steady him, to lessen the enormity of the realization that he'd just slain three men. He murmured to her. The fragility of her body called up something powerful in him, something protective and carnal at the same time. He tried to keep his hands soothing and impersonal, but there wasn't an inch of him that wasn't intensely aware of her as a woman. He caught a strand of her pretty hair, red-gold and candle-bright in the glow of the fire, and drew it away from her face. "It's all right now, Annie," he whispered.

She was struggling, drowning emotionally between awful memories of near-disaster and almost hysterical relief because it was over. She hadn't cried or given in to her terror during the abduction; even when the man named Paulo had ripped the clothes from her body, she'd felt more helpless fury than panic. Now she was suffering the reaction, and could do nothing but clutch at Brodie's shirtfront and let his low, calming voice slow her blood.

In time her teeth stopped their incessant chattering; her heartbeat thudded in a steady rhythm. She felt the heat of the fire on her legs and became aware of her condition, her state of undress. Something held her immobile, though, locked inside the hardness and security of his arms, suffering with increasing pleasure the gentle hand stroking her hair back from her face.

He held her away a little to see her and murmured, "Did they hurt you?"

She shook her head. She was grateful they were facing the fire, unable to see the bodies, but she knew they were there. She tried to reconcile this man who held her so tenderly with the one who had shot three people minutes ago, coldly, cleanly, and without compunction. It wasn't possible. She stifled a quick shiver of cold or of fear and stole a glance at him. "Your face!" she cried, seeing the effects of his wound clearly for the first time.

He touched his fingers to his cheekbone gingerly, noting it still oozed blood. But not much; it wasn't serious. A little piece of his ear at the top was gone for good, though. Luckily she hadn't noticed that. "Might leave a scar," he said quietly.

After a few seconds she understood the implication. Nicholas had had no scar. If they met people he had known, they would have to think of a way to explain it. Suddenly the full burden of the risk she'd undertaken returned like a sack of stones on her shoulders, heavy and unavoidable. Mr. Brodie had saved her, but he was not her friend. And this peace between them was an illusion. In a matter of weeks he would be sent back to prison. Where, for all she knew, he belonged.

He felt the slight stiffening of her body and sensed her subtle retreat. In self-defense, his sympathy hardened, cooled. Extreme circumstances made strange allies, but the truce was over now. He stood up abruptly.

Her stockinged feet hit the floor with a slap and she gave a soft, startled cry. The air felt chilly and rude on her bare skin. Turning her back to him, she went closer to the fire, as close as she could get, in need of its warmth more than before. She heard a muffled scraping sound and guessed what it was. She didn't want to turn around but found herself doing it anyway, and watching in silent horror as he dragged two bodies, rumpled and ungainly in death, out of the cottage. When he returned, he was sweating from the exertion, but his face was pale and set.

He looked at her across the width of the room, taking note of the protective way she held herself, the careful impassivity of her features. "I've never killed anyone before," he said hoarsely, unwillingly. What did he care what she believed? To save himself, he sneered his next words. "But you don't believe that, do you, Mrs. Balfour?"

She didn't know what to say. She didn't know the answer to his question, and he frightened her. "Why should I?" she whispered. He moved toward her. She could hold her ground or step back and risk setting herself on fire. She stood still. How had she ever felt safe with this man?

"Why should you?" He leaned one hand against the rough wooden mantel behind her head, trapping her with his body in front, the fire behind. "How about for old time's sake? Or out of respect for your husband. Nick the upright, Nick the perfect." He lifted his hand and rested it on top of her shoulder. Her nostrils thinned and her light brown eyes turned fierce. "If he was so good, Annie, how could his brother be so bad? Hm?" With a little tug, he pulled her chemise down over her arm, baring her shoulder.

Anna held herself statue-still, not breathing, daring him. His hard mouth softened. There was a light in his pale eyes she'd never seen; he looked nothing at all like Nicholas to her in the second before he bent and put his lips on the naked place he'd made on her shoulder. Her eyes dimmed and closed, and she could hear her heartbeat in her ears. "Don't," she said, then felt the wetness of his tongue, lightly rasping, his lips softly sucking. "Oh, don't." He raised his head. His mouth glistened and his breathing was uneven. She'd been wrong; the moment of danger wasn't over, it was just starting. It was now. She remembered everything about his kiss, before, on the ship, and felt capitulation surge slowly, giddily, in her limbs and her abdomen. She shut her eyes to hide her surrender, knowing her face betrayed her anyway. Her mind closed on her only defense. "Nicholas was upright," she said shakily. "He would not have done this, not taken advantage."

The fire in Brodie's eyes burned out slowly. He didn't move, but she sensed his absolute withdrawal. "Ah, no," he said carefully, "not Nick. Nick was a gentleman, through and through." He reached out, and this time she couldn't repress a quick, panicky gasp. He smiled and tugged her shift up to cover her shoulder. He whispered. "Either that, Annie, or he didn't want you half as badly as I do." Her eyes flew to his face. "Get dressed, O'Dunne should be here soon."

"Where... where did he go?"

"He went for help." He stepped back, away from her.

Aiden went for help, she thought. And you came, and saved me. She watched him walk out the door and close it quietly behind him, leaving her alone. "Thank you," she said to the empty room.

Aiden, Billy Flowers, and two other men rode up a few minutes later. O'Dunne surveyed the corpses in front of the cottage, then strode past Brodie without speaking. Inside, he and Anna embraced. Brodie watched them from the door-way, his arms folded, face expressionless.

"My dear, are you all right?"

"Yes, I'm fine." But she was so tired.

"They didn't hurt you?"

"No, no. Aiden, who are those men?"

"From the village, a few miles from here. One speaks English. He said the men who robbed us are...were brothers, that they've terrorized the area for months. Are you sure you're all right? They didn't" He hesitated uncomfortably.

"No, I'm fine. They did nothing. Mr. Brodie got here in time."

She turned, still holding Aiden's hand, at a noise in the doorway. Brodie was backing up slowly while Billy lumbered toward him, holding a length of chain. In the middle of the room they both stopped. Billy had a lump the size of a lemon in the center of his forehead, but seemed otherwise unaffected by his encounter with the back of the coach. He threw O'Dunne a questioning glance. "Wot d'you sigh, guv?"

For an instant Anna's eyes locked with Brodie's. He was waiting to see if she would protest. She knew it, and said nothing. Her fear of him had shifted; it came from another source now.

Brodie saw that she wouldn't speak, and he smiled a chilly, frightening smile. "It doesn't matter what he says, Billy, you won't chain me again. Not unless you kill me first."

Billy's jaw went slack. He looked back at O'Dunne for guidance. In that second Brodie made a grab for the chain, yanked it out of his huge hands, and slung it across the room into the fire.

"Bloody 'ell!" roared Billy. He started to lunge at Brodie, but Anna's hand shot out to clutch at his coat sleeve.

"Stop it, stop! Leave him alone!"

But it was Brodie who was spoiling for a fight with all of them, it seemed. He stood with hands fisted, jaw jutting aggressively, anger crackling like live sparks in his eyes. "Try it," he taunted Billy, but his gaze was on Anna.