Untamed (14 page)

“He shall not blame you, monsieur.” How could she sound so calm when her heart was pounding? “I shall see to that.”

Amalie followed the soldier inside, her eyes taking a moment to adjust to the darkness. And when they did, she felt sick.

The Ranger stood in the tiny cell, chained by his neck, wrists, and ankles, wearing only a pair of ill-fitting breeches, new and old bruises upon his face, his long hair tangled, the fresh scar on his chest exposed. The hollows in his cheeks seemed even more pronounced over the dark growth of his beard, and there were shadows beneath his eyes.
Mon Dieu,
had they left him standing all night long?

He stared at her, clearly surprised to see her. “Miss Chauvenet?”

Amalie turned to the soldier. “Thank you, monsieur. You may leave us.”

The young man gave a sharp bow and was gone.

The Ranger took a step in her direction, his gait marred by a slight limp, his chains dragging through the straw. Standing upright, he seemed so much taller, so much more threatening than he had lying in bed. His body all muscle, he reminded her of a caged animal—fierce, dangerous, untamed. “You shouldna be here, lass.”

“I am so sorry, monsieur.” She walked over to his cell, grasped the cold iron bars. “In seeking to ease your suffering, I have hastened you to this moment.”

He took another step toward her. “Dinnae fret. It isna your doin’. I pray they didna punish you.”

She shook her head. “No. Not yet.”

“Then leave me!” His voice took on an urgent tone. “Go afore they find you here. I wouldna see you risk yourself further for my sake.”

“I came only to bring you this.” She reached inside her bodice, drew his wooden rosary from between her breasts, then reached between the bars and held it out for him. “I could not rest until you wore it again.”

For a moment he stared at her, a strange look in his eyes. Then he took another shuffling step, the chain that held him clanking. “You spoke the prayers wi’ it?”

“Yes, monsieur, as I promised.”

He reached out for it with his shackled hands, the naked gratitude on his face putting a hard lump in her throat. “I am most grateful. Thank you, lass.”

But rather than taking the rosary from her, he closed his big hands over her smaller one, raised her hand to his lips, and kissed it, his gaze seeking and holding hers. It was the merest brush of his lips against her skin, and yet the heat of it quivered through her, scattering her thoughts, the intensity in his eyes making it impossible to breathe.

“M-monsieur?”

Morgan saw in Amalie’s eyes that he’d startled her, but he saw something else there, as well—need. Aye, she felt the pull of it, just as he did. And yet, ’twould surely be the last time he’d see her. He had no right to do this to her, to rouse desires that could only trouble her. She was pledged to the Church, after all, an innocent who had showered him with compassion when she’d had every right to hate him. His debt to her should not be repaid like this.

Fighting to control himself, he took the beads, the smooth wood warm with the scent of her skin, and slipped the rosary over his head and beneath the iron collar. “There is no way to repay your kindness, no words to tell you how grateful I am for all you’ve done—most of all for your forgiveness.”

“In the end I have done nothing.” A bright sheen came into her eyes. Tears? For
him
? “Why must you fight for the British? Why could you not have chosen to fight for France instead?”

He’d tried to tell her the story once, but they’d been interrupted. Now there wasn’t time. “I chose nothing, Amalie. It was forced upon me.”

Her brow furrowed as if in confusion. “What do you mean?”

“There’s no time for this. Leave this place afore Rillieux finds you here, and dinnae return. I wouldna have you see me after today.” In truth, he wished she had not seen him as he was in that moment—filthy, stinking, weak, blood matted in three weeks’ growth of beard, his warrior braids undone, his hair a tangled mess.

But she didn’t seem to hear him. “The British
forced
you to fight for them?”

“Aye, my brothers and I were compelled to fight by that whoreson William Wentworth. He accused us of a murder we didna commit and gave us the choice of bein’ hanged or takin’ the king’s shilling. I myself would have been glad to die, but I didna want to see my brothers dancin’ at the end of a rope.”

“How could he do such a thing?”

Because it was clear she would not leave until she knew the full story, Morgan quickly told her how Wentworth had seen them fight a street brawl, attempting to protect a whore from a man who’d tried to pay for her services with the edge of a blade. He told her how Wentworth had set men to follow them, then had them arrested the next morning. He told her how the
mac-dìolain
had made it clear that he would use his position as the grandson of Britain’s king to make sure they died at the end of a noose—unless they agreed to serve him as Rangers.

You will report to me at Fort Edward by August twenty-first and serve me until death releases you or this war is ended. If you fail to appear or abandon your post, you will be shot for desertion and your brothers will be hanged for murder.

As he recalled the words that had damned them, it seemed to Morgan as if it had happened only yesterday. And now it had brought him to this.

“There is no court in the colonies nor in Britain that would take the word of a Scot over that of their king’s grandson,” he explained. “Now go, lass!”

But a strange look had come over Amalie’s face. “I must tell Bourlamaque.”

“It willna matter to him. I have slain too many of his soldiers, and now my life is forfeit. You must go and let this trouble you no longer!”

But then the door was thrown open, and Rillieux walked in, fury on his face. He shouted angrily at Amalie in French, sparing only a quick, hate-filled glance for Morgan. “What are
you
doing here? You would defy my orders?”

Clearly afraid of him, she took a step back, but her chin went up. “I am not a soldier to be ordered about, Lieutenant Rillieux. I came to pray with—”

As if he’d forgotten Morgan was there, Rillieux grasped her arm, jerked her roughly to him, hissing at her from between clenched teeth. “For all your piety, you have not learned to obey as a woman should.”

Her face the image of feminine outrage, Amalie tried to pull away from him. “Let go of me! You cannot treat me—”

Rillieux slipped a hand behind her neck and yanked her against him, cutting off her words with another violent kiss, his other hand grasping her bottom.

Before Morgan knew what he was about, he lunged forward, thrust one hand through the bars, and grabbed the bastard by the throat. “Let…her…go!”

Chapter 9

A
malie shrank back from Lieutenant Rillieux’s hateful kiss, abruptly freed from his painful grip. Then time itself seemed to stop—and she saw.

Reaching with his body turned sideways, the chain that bound him drawn tight, Monsieur MacKinnon had the lieutenant by the throat, his eyes dark with rage, one big hand thrust between the bars and choking the life from Lieutenant Rillieux’s body, even as the iron collar that encircled his neck cut off his own breath. Lieutenant Rillieux’s face was red, his eyes seeming to bulge out of his head, his fingers scrabbling to break the Ranger’s deadly grip, his mouth open and silent.

Stunned by the brutality of the kiss and the scene before her, Amalie struggled to find her tongue. “
Arrêtez!
Stop!”

Monsieur MacKinnon met her gaze and choked out one word.
“Go!”

The Ranger’s muscles shook with effort, most of all his injured leg, and Amalie realized he lacked the strength to sustain this for long. He wasn’t trying to kill the lieutenant. He was trying to protect her.

Then the terrible truth came to her. If no one were here to stop him, Lieutenant Rillieux would beat the Ranger to within an inch of his life the moment the Ranger released him.

Bourlamaque!

She picked up her skirts and ran. Out the door and across the parade grounds she ran, heedless of soldiers’ stares, not stopping until she reached Bourlamaque’s study. Terrified of what might be happening back in the guardhouse, she opened the door and ran inside without knocking. “Monsieur! Please, you must come! Lieutenant Rillieux and the Ranger are going to kill each other!”

Bourlamaque stood beside his writing table, his finger pointing at something on a chart of New France, Lieutenant Fouchet and Lieutenant Durand beside him, the three of them staring at her with startled looks upon their faces.

Bourlamaque frowned. “Catch your breath, Amalie, and explain yourself.”

So Amalie did, the story pouring out of her in a rush, tears stinging her eyes, fear making her tremble. She told Bourlamaque how she’d prayed with the Ranger’s rosary last night and had tried to return it this morning only to find his bed empty. She told him how she’d gone to the guardhouse to return the rosary when Lieutenant Rillieux had found her and shouted at her, then grabbed her and forced another painful kiss upon her. She told him how the Ranger had grabbed Lieutenant Rillieux by the throat to stop him, choking the lieutenant while strangling upon his own chains.

“I fear Lieutenant Rillieux will kill him, monsieur! Please, you must stop them!”

Bourlamaque turned to his two young lieutenants. “Go to the guardhouse at once, and bring Lieutenant Rillieux to me. Do not harm MacKinnon.”

Fouchet and Durand bowed—and were gone at a run.

Amalie met her guardian’s gaze and saw that he was not pleased with her. She sank into a curtsy. “Forgive me, monsieur. I did not mean—”

He walked over to her, reached out his hand. “Rise, Amalie.”

She stood, certain that he was about to censure her.

But instead, he grasped her chin and tilted her head to the side, his gaze dropping to her neck, a dark look spreading over her face. “Did Lieutenant Rillieux do this?”

Amalie raised a hand to her neck, suddenly aware of the sting of scratched skin. She touched the scratch, felt something wet, and withdrew her fingers to find her own blood on her fingertips.
“Oui.”

He motioned to a chair before his writing table. “Sit. Tell me once more what happened. And go slowly this time.”

She repeated the story, filling in missing pieces—Lieutenant Rillieux’s morning visits to the hospital to beat the Ranger, the humiliating cruelty of his first kiss, the way he’d touched her on her bottom this time, his fingers digging into her flesh. “I do not wish to be near him, monsieur. He…frightens me.”

Bourlamaque sat behind his writing table, a look of weariness on his face. He rubbed a hand over his clean-shaven jaw. “Amalie, Amalie, whatever shall I do with you? You have done everything I’ve asked of you, and yet now because of you I must chastise one of my best and most promising officers.”

Because of
her
?

The surge of temper she felt must have shown on her face, for in the next instant Bourlamaque spoke as if he’d read her thoughts.

“No, Amalie, I do not blame you for his actions. A stolen kiss is one thing, but this…” His gaze dropped to her neck. “He knows full well that to touch you in such a fashion is wicked. But he was right when he said that it was a mistake to have you tend MacKinnon. What you did yesterday—unshackling him while he was sleeping—was incredibly foolish. You are too softhearted, too inexperienced to be entrusted with the care of such a man. You are not to go near him again.”

Amalie had known this was coming, but to hear Bourlamaque speak the words felt like a blow. She would not see the Ranger again. And soon, he would be dead.

Her throat grew tight. She swallowed.
“Bien, monsieur.”

He stood, a troubled look on his face. “You have had a most distressing day. I am sorry for that. I wish I knew how best to comfort you, but I am only a soldier. Please go to your room and rest. I shall have tea brought up and send Monsieur Lambert to have a look at you.”

Amalie stood, gave a curtsy.
“Bien, monsieur. Merci.”

She had reached the door when she remembered.

How, oh, how could she have forgotten?

She turned to face her guardian once more. “Forgive me, monsieur, but there is one other thing, something important the Ranger told me that you will want to hear.”

Bourlamaque’s brow bent in an impatient frown. “And what is that?”

“He and his brothers do not fight for Britain of their own choice. They were pressed into service by a British officer, who threatened to see them hanged as criminals if they refused.”

Bourlamaque’s frown deepened. “Men are pressed into service every day, Amalie. This is of no importance. Go to your—”

“But, monsieur, it
does
matter!” The words were out before she could stop them. “Could we not use this knowledge to win him to our side?”

Bourlamaque shook his head, looking truly vexed with her. “He will not betray his men, Amalie. I have already tried to bargain with him. I offered him a painless death and Catholic burial in exchange for answers to my questions, and he did not accept. Please go to your room, and stay—”

“You offered him only death.” It seemed so obvious to Amalie. Why could Bourlamaque not see it? “What if you offered him life? What if you gave him sanctuary instead of death and invited him to fight beside you?”

“Sanctuary?”
For a moment Bourlamaque stared at her as if she’d gone mad. Then his expression slowly changed from vexation to something like amazement. “Surely, it cannot be done. Orders have been given, promises made. And yet to have a MacKinnon fighting for France…”

From outside came the sound of men’s voices—Fouchet, Durand, Rillieux.

“Go now, Amalie. Stay in your room and rest. Trouble yourself no more about these matters. I shall see to Lieutenant Rillieux.”

Not wanting to see the lieutenant again. Amalie hurried out the door and up the stairs, shutting the door to her room behind her.

Would Bourlamaque consider what she’d said, or was it already too late?