by Brianna York
“We are gaining on them then,” Tess said.
Matthew nodded, then swung up onto Deuce’s back. He reached up to stroke the gelding’s neck briefly. “I hope that we shall be able to narrow the margin yet more, but the horses are tired already and I do not think that we shall be able to travel much farther tonight.” He glanced at Forrest after he had said this, and the two men exchanged a speaking look before Forrest nodded and mounted up.
“Shall I carry the lantern?” Tess asked, knowing that the two men must be tired from having carried it all this time.
Matthew opened his mouth to protest, but Forrest was faster. “Do you think that you can carry it and ride at the same time?” he asked her bluntly.
She bristled a bit. “Why of course I can,” she shot back, bringing her horse alongside his and holding her hand out imperiously.
He regarded her thoughtfully for a long moment, then smiled at her. She was a bit shocked by the sudden appearance of that smile and she recognized suddenly a vast part of Forrest’s charm for Alex. That smile was a bountiful reward for having earned Forrest’s respect. He silently offered her the lantern and she took it from him, her face remaining composed until she had a hold of the lantern. She flashed him her pirate’s smile, then cued her horse and cantered away. Laughing, Forrest hurried after her and Matthew and Rob followed suit.
∞∞∞
“Wake up!” the voice was Marcus’s and the rough hand on her shoulder had to be his as well. She groaned as his shaking made her nausea increase a notch. She wanted to tell him to stop tossing her about lest she cast up her accounts on his boots, but she could not speak around the gag. She slowly sat up, feeling her head reel unpleasantly before steadying enough for her to open her eyes.
“Come on and get out,” Marcus ordered her. “We will have to stop for a few hours only, so I suggest that you use the time wisely and sleep rather than in another attempt to escape.” Alex nodded obediently, ignoring the discomfort that the movement caused her. “No one in a place like this will believe you are anything but our traveling companion, Alex, so you can save for another time the story that you have no doubt already thought up.” She had, in fact, not thought up any story at all, so she just nodded again and tried to tell him that she understood what he was saying.
“What did she say?” Dartmoor demanded from outside the coach.
“Impossible to tell with her mouth stuffed like that, Dartmoor,” Marcus replied impatiently, forcing her to her feet and pushing her toward the door.
“We shall have to take that gag off long enough to get her inside her room,” Dartmoor informed Marcus. “I should hate to alarm the innkeeper unduly, although I paid him enough extra blunt that he should not complain too much about one of us staying with her while the other sleeps in the room next door.”
“How do you intend to keep her silent?” Marcus wanted to know but Alex felt his fingers on the knot in the gag at the back of her head.
Dartmoor smiled coldly. “It will not be difficult with this to assist me,” he replied, holding up a wicked-looking knife. The knife gleamed dully in the weak light from the carriage lamps and Alex swallowed hard. “Obviously a gun did little to impress you earlier, love. I think, however, that the horror of a slow and painful death from a knife wound should convince you that I will have your silence. Do you promise to be quiet?” Alex stared at the instrument of torture in his hand for a moment, then nodded firmly.
“Excellent,” he said silkily. “Take off the gag, Marcus.”
Alex felt Marcus’s fingers tugging at the knot and then he slipped the gag from her mouth. She fitted her teeth together with relief, feeling the abused muscles in her jaw pull and then readjust to normalcy. When she opened her eyes again, Dartmoor was regarding her with that glint of insane amusement that she found so unsettling, but she forced herself to remove any emotion from her face so that he would not sense her revulsion.
“Walk ahead of me, my dear,” Dartmoor bade her, slipping behind her and pressing the knife to her back. She walked ahead of him across the stable yard, attempting to take in as many details as she could despite the darkness and her pounding head. The inn was laid out in typical fashion, with galleried buildings surrounding the cobbled square that was the stable yard. Alex glanced briefly to her right and saw that the sign swinging fretfully in the wind bore the name of the inn; The Silver Stirrup. She thought with some relief that the buildings appeared to be in better repair than those of the first inn they had stopped at.
She knew that she could not expect anyone else at the inn to be awake at this hour, but she was still disappointed when they encountered no one on their way to the rooms that Dartmoor had paid for.
“Here is yours, Alex dear,” Dartmoor informed her, pulling a key from his pocket and turning it adeptly in the lock. He pushed the door open to reveal a modestly sized room with a single bed and a roaring fire in the grate. Alex stepped instinctively toward the fire, drawing away from Dartmoor abruptly. He let her go and stayed by the door with Marcus. Alex noticed a tray with a cold spread on it, and glanced at the men in the doorway.
“Yes, you may go ahead and eat,” Dartmoor told her, and Alex forced herself to smile gratefully at him before beginning to eat. “Her manners have improved some,” Dartmoor commented idly to Marcus and Alex grit her teeth. “Perhaps she is learning.”
And perhaps you are blinded by your own arrogance, Alex thought in return, forcing herself to remain calm and composed.
“Who is going to take the first turn watching her?” Marcus wanted to know.
There was a little silence as Dartmoor thought, then, “I am quite done in. You will take the first watch. I shall be back in two hours to relieve you.”
“Fine.” Marcus’s tone made it clear that he thought the arrangement anything but acceptable, but he did not protest outright.
“You will be wanting this, no doubt,” Dartmoor said, passing the knife to his accomplice. He glanced at Alex again, but she studiously ignored him and ate her meal. “Watch her well,” he reminded Marcus before leaving them. Alex heard him open the door to the room next to hers and then shut it behind him. She relaxed somewhat and glanced at Marcus who was regarding her ruefully.
“I do believe that you have gotten the short end of the stick, my good man,” she told him in a courteous tone of voice before returning her gaze to her food.
Marcus barked with irritated laughter in reply to that. “I have thought that myself more than once on this god-forsaken journey,” he replied.
Alex abandoned her dinner and regarded Marcus closely. “I must ask you this, Marcus. Why did you help him kidnap me? What is in it for you?”
Marcus sighed and crossed the room to remove the chair from before the fire and place it before the door. He settled onto the chair and glared at Dartmoor’s knife with disgust for a moment, then stuck it into the wall behind him and pulled his pistol from his pocket. He crossed his arms over his chest, the gun flashing brightly as it caught the light from the fireplace. “Everything,” he replied to her question.
She rolled her eyes at that. “What does that mean, precisely?” she prodded.
He regarded her for a long moment, then, “Everything that I have always wanted, Alex my dear. Revenge.”
Alex’s expression was slightly bewildered as she said, “Revenge? Against whom, Marcus? Myself?”
Marcus chuckled bitterly. “Indirectly, I suppose.”
“Who then, do you really wish to harm?” Alex demanded, tired of his games.
The smile faded from his face. “All right then, if you want to know that badly, I wish to harm your dear brother and all men like him. There is not room enough for men such as them and myself in this world. I shall be making room for myself by removing them from positions of such power as they now hold.”
“I don’t understand,” Alex stated flatly.
Marcus removed his great coat and hung it over the back of a chair. “You wouldn’t I suppose,” He settled into the chai
r and glanced up at her. “Your brother seems to have been raised without any notion of the station to which we belong. He feels that is it acceptable for those of a much lower social standing to move in our circles, to marry into our families and to over throw the carefully regulated order of society. You should no more be considering marrying that upstart Baron than the man in the moon. Surely you can see that our dearest Matthew is far too progressive in his attitudes to protect the wealth and glory of his family name?”
Alex forced herself to eat more of the food on the tray, knowing that she would need her strength. She tried to ignore the queasy and frightened turning of her stomach. “You feel this way and yet you would help Dartmoor in this insanity? What can he possibly want from me but the chance to rise above his current station?”
Marcus chuckled. “The irony of this situation is that Dartmoor’s family originally owned your beloved East Gate. It is their ancestral home. Your father took it as a means for a debt to be paid to him that was owed by their father. If the Dartmoors had been blessed with a different father, they would have been able to move about in the same circles as you and I, my dear.”
Alex felt a shock at his words, but they made the situation she found herself in make so much more sense. “Dartmoor wants me to marry him because he wants his property back,” she said flatly. She shot a sharp look at Marcus, “and if Tess cannot marry my brother, I presume that she can marry you. Am I right? Is this what you are plotting?”
Marcus allowed a small smile to curve his lips. “I might have been thinking about ways that the man could repay me once I get you into Scotland and help you to jump the broom with him.”
Alex felt as if he had slapped her across the face. She stared at him in abject horror, unable to feel anything, but able to see clearly for the first time. He was correct in one way; there was no way to reconcile the presence of a man of so little worth and so very great an evil as himself amongst men such as Matthew and Forrest. “And all these years I thought that I knew you,” she whispered, her tone flat but still communicating her great revulsion.
Marcus looked grim in the flickering light from the fire. He glanced at his revolver and then back to her face. “Do not trouble yourself overmuch, Alex. We all must be wrong someday about someone.”
She closed her eyes tightly, memories of dancing with him at balls and laughing at some joke he had made rising unbidden to the surface of her consciousness. How could she have been so mistaken about him? How could all of them have been so mistaken? She knew that it would be quite some time before she would be able to understand that.
“Eat and then sleep a bit,” Marcus told her. “Attempting to understand me will be a futile exercise for you. You are not capable of it.”
She forced her eyes open and looked at him across the length of the room. Marcus shivered at the look in her eyes. He felt he had been wiped from existence as if he had never been and never would be again for that matter. “It is good advice,” she said in a harsh monotone before turning away and finishing the food on the tray. When she had finished eating, she curled up on the bed in her clothes and forced herself to relax. Being still suited her head and it quieted its complaining to a dull roar.
She waited patiently for some sign that Marcus had slipped off to sleep. She thought that perhaps an hour went by before she heard him snoring. She nearly laughed with relief at the thought that Dartmoor had not been very wise in leaving Marcus to guard her. No one slept more soundly than he did.
She eased her way to the edge of the bed and put her feet on the floor. She glanced at Marcus to verify that he was asleep, then rose slowly. Gathering her skirts into her hand, she tiptoed across the room. Marcus had placed himself before the door, but she thought that she could slip behind him and get out without too much difficulty. She leaned carefully to the side, trying not to brush up against him by accident and managed to turn the doorknob without making any noise.
She pushed the door open, praying that it would not squeak. It obliged her by swinging silently into the hallway. She closed her eyes with relief and slid painstakingly between Marcus’s chair and the doorframe. Once in the hall, she glanced to her left and saw nothing to alarm her, so she stepped around the door and started to push it shut. Suddenly she heard footsteps down the hall, and she raised her head sharply. She watched in horror as two rather unsightly men approached her down the length of the narrow hall. She managed to shut the door as silently as she had opened it, but she wasted valuable time in doing so. By the time she was free to make her way down the hall, the two ruffians were nearly upon her. Willing them to be silent, she cast her eyes down and started past them.
“And what have we here?” one of the men said, a leer evident in his voice. “A good evening to you, lady.”
Alex tried to slip past them without answering, but the one who had not spoken, stepped in front of her, blocking her escape. “Lady you say? I thinks not,” he said to his companion. “If she was a lady, her man wouldna be letting her wander about so late all by her lonesome.”
Alex glanced in desperation at Dartmoor’s closed door. Hoping that he was not a light sleeper, she made to hurry around the man blocking her path.
“We be willing to pay for ye, miss,” the man assured her, stepping in front of her again and reaching out to grasp her shoulders. “Ye can ask my friend if ye like, but I’ll tell ye I always pay me debts.”
Alex struggled to break his grasp, but he was holding her too tightly. “Let me go!” she hissed at him.
“And why should I do that, might I ask ye?” he demanded, his breath sour in her face.
“Because I will dismember you a piece at a time if you do not release her, my good man.” The voice was Dartmoor’s and Alex felt her heart sink. She went limp in the scoundrel’s hands and turned her head to stare dejectedly at Dartmoor where he was leaning casually against the doorframe holding a pistol and smiling in that lightless, dangerous manner of his.
“I didna know she was already claimed, yer Lordship,” the man said quickly, releasing Alex and scuttling around her. He had mistaken Dartmoor’s rank, but not his intent. “A thousand apologies.”
“No need for all that, my good man,” Dartmoor assured him. “Goodnight.”
“Yes, a goodnight to ye to, yer Lordship,” the man replied, sketching a drunken bow in Dartmoor’s general direction before turning to scurry after his friend down the hall.
Dartmoor watched them go, then turned to Alex. He was still wearing that terrible smile, and Alex knew that she shivered at the sight of it. “Well, Alex,” he said, “It appears that I was incorrect earlier when I thought that you were beginning to see the benefits of being obedient. Back to your room now.” He gestured with his gun toward the door to the room where Marcus slept, and she closed her eyes tightly and did as she was told.
“Open the door,” he ordered her, and she turned the handle and pulled the door open. Dartmoor seized her arm and forced her to step aside, revealing Marcus still asleep in the chair. Dartmoor stared at the other man for a protracted moment, a sardonic smile distorting his mouth, then brought up his foot and shoved the chair as hard as he could. Marcus spilled onto the floor in a heap, his pistol flying out of his grasp and scraping noisily as it spun across the room.
“What the hell?” he shouted, untangling himself and glancing toward the doorway to see Dartmoor staring down at him, disgust evident on his face.
“A fine guard you made,” Dartmoor said drily, shoving Alex into the room ahead of him. “Go and sleep since that is all you seem to be good for. I shall come and get you when it is time for us to leave.”
Marcus managed to untangle himself from the chair and get to his feet, his eyes blazing with anger. “As you wish,” he said sarcastically before collecting his gun and exiting the room. Alex watched him go, knowing that with him went her last chance at escape.
When the other man had gone, Dartmoor closed the door and righted the chair. “Sit,” he ordered her, and with a sigh, she did as
he told her. “Since it was not really your fault that you escaped this time,” Dartmoor informed her as he bound her tightly to the chair, “I shall not punish you unduly, but I am afraid that I shall not be able to trust you again, love.” He yanked at the knots he had fashioned around her wrists, causing her to wince.
“Open your mouth again,” he ordered her. She hesitated and he leaned closer to speak directly into her ear. “I thought that we had been over all that before, Alex. I would rather not hurt you again, you know.” She drew a deep breath, then opened her mouth.
When he was satisfied that she was tied securely, he crossed the room and settled upon the bed. He laid his pistol on his stomach and propped his head up on his hands. “I am a terribly light sleeper as you now know, love,” he informed her. “Be so kind as to be silent so that I can sleep.” She refused to look at him any longer and shut her eyes firmly. He laughed in reply, then settled down to sleep.
Alex forced her mind to travel to someplace more pleasant so that she might endure. She hoped that Matthew and Forrest were getting close. She was not sure how much longer she could survive such horror.
Thirty-Eight
T
ess’s arm ached and she thought that she detected a bit of a flaw in the rhythm of Hermes’s gaits. She struggled to hold the lantern high enough to give them the light they required. She knew that even Matthew and Forrest were tiring at this point as they had not exchanged a single word for miles. Just when she thought that she would be forced to ask Forrest to take the lantern back, she saw the inn.
“We shall stop for the night there,” Matthew told the group. Forrest did not argue, although Tess sensed his reluctance. They cantered up to the gate into the stable yard, then broke to a walk. Tess glanced up at the sign over the archway into the yard as she rode beneath it. The Silver Stirrup, it said. A fanciful name for a common inn, she thought a bit caustically as she glanced about her. She hoped that the rooms were at least modestly clean and that there was food to be had.