by Rebecca King
“How is he?”
Elias grinned outright. “He is cursing fluidly and grumpy because he is hungry and wants to see Lucy.”
Ruth smiled. She thought it would be rather wonderful to have a man care about her so strongly that he was miserable if he couldn’t see her. From what she had seen of Morgan’s fiancé, though, she understood the man’s addiction to her. Lucy was stunningly beautiful.
Elias looked at the doorway that led to the room Morgan was in but didn’t make any attempt to venture toward the men who were gathered there. When he spoke, his words were for Ruth and fervent when he said: “God, don’t do anything like that again. Don’t leave me again. I have paced, fretted, wondered, and worried about you until it damned well nearly drove me out of my mind.”
Ruth was astonished and blushed furiously. It was the last thing that she expected to hear him say. “I said that we could do it and we did. People didn’t see anything odd about it either. Nobody paid Maud and I the slightest bit of attention.”
“Except Rointon.”
That, Ruth couldn’t argue with.
CHAPTER TEN
Two days later, Elias was on watch and ambling around the cottage’s tiny kitchen, stopping only occasionally to peer into the darkness outside. With no candles lit inside the room he could stand in the shadows and look out across the snowy landscape unnoticed by anybody lurking outside. The landscape looked achingly beautiful when bathed in the moonlight. The icy fingers of the tall trees and ivory carpet of rolling fields shimmered in a silvery shroud which twinkled like a thousand sparkling diamonds. Elias would have savoured being able to simply enjoy so much refined beauty had it not been for the dark shadow he noticed dart beneath the trees close to the house.
“Damn it,” he growled.
“What’s wrong?” Reuben whispered from the doorway.
“We aren’t alone.” Elias and Reuben hurried into the room Morgan still occupied. Without looking at the bed, Elias opened the shutter a fraction of an inch and pointed to the moving shadows at the far end of one the cart tracks.
“It’s Rointon’s men.” Reuben set to work waking the men up who were sleeping in various locations around the cottage. While uncomfortable because they were living together in such close confines, it had been agreed that it was too cold and dangerous for anybody to patrol the perimeter of the property outside, especially at night. The men had therefore decided to position themselves at various locations inside the property where they could protect each other and the house if Rointon decided to mount an attack.
“They are really foolish enough to try to attack us,” Al snorted once he had seen the men on horseback gathering beneath the heavy canopy of snow-laden branches directly opposite the cottage. “God, the bloody fools.”
“At least they are here and not at the safe house,” Morgan snorted.
“They think they can escape because they are on horseback,” Duncan muttered.
“You stay here and keep guard over Morgan,” Evan ordered Reuben before checking his gun for shot and disappearing into the kitchen.
Together with Jarvis, he loaded all the Star Elite’s weapons and made sure that each man had a pouch of shot readily available. Everything they needed sat in the middle of the kitchen table, available for anybody who wanted them. Earlier that day, Mark had been told what each item was and had orders to ferry spare guns and ammunition to anybody who called for it so the men could keep firing on the enemy outside uninterrupted.
“Take your positions. Shoot to kill as many as you can before they reach the house,” Zach called even though Al was the official boss of this particular branch of the Star Elite.
Al hurried into the kitchen and opened a shutter overlooking the back of the house.
“You can go in there,” Duncan informed Elias with a nod at Ruth’s bed chamber door.
For once, Elias didn’t argue.
Duncan crept into Maud’s bed chamber to wake her up. On his way past Maud’s bed, Duncan nudged Mark who was napping on a make-shift bed in the corner of the room. “You can help us now lad. Rointon is here.” This had an electrifying effect upon Mark who immediately vaulted to his feet and hurried into the kitchen even before he had woken up properly.
Elias crept into Ruth’s bed chamber and shook her awake. The urge to kiss her was strong, especially when she sat upright and a long curtain of hair fell temptingly around her shoulders in a halo of silken temptation, but he forced himself to say: “We have trouble,” instead.
Ruth struggled to shake off her sleepiness. She blinked at Elias while she tried to get her recalcitrant mind to absorb what he had said. Like pebbles in a murky pond the words eventually settled on her consciousness, but when they did, they fell all around her with devastating effect. “Rointon’s here? Now?” She felt sick.
“Try not to worry, eh?” Elias offered with a smile. “Everything will be all right.”
“What are they doing?” she whispered, throwing the covers back.
“They are preparing to attack us. You need to get dressed just in case we need to leave in a hurry,” Elias said.
Snatching her clothing off the dresser, Ruth hurried behind the retiring screen. It was startling that the cottage was so quiet. She had expected panic, or at least constant activity, but it was calm and quite peaceful – until the first bullet struck the kitchen window.
“Get down!” Al bellowed. His returning fire was deafening.
Within seconds, more gunfire was exchanged. Mark and Maud set to work passing bullets and weapons to the men while crouched on the floor out of sight.
“Get down. Curl up in the corner over there,” Elias ordered Ruth before he nudged the window open and shot his first target. He cut down two of Rointon’s men and waited for a third to separate himself from the trees. Once he had watched the man fall as well, Elias slammed the window closed and reloaded his weapon with swift, jerky moments, before he reopened the window and selected another target. “Mark! I need bullets,” he bellowed.
“I’ll go,” Ruth huffed.
“Stay here,” Elias bit out. His curse was fierce when a bullet slammed into the window frame inches from his face. He tried to take aim again, but two more bullets slammed into the window and shutter. When the bullets had temporarily stopped, Elias took aim again but couldn’t see anything more than indefinable shadows. “We have to get out there,” he called to Al.
“No.” Al’s voice was harsh.
“Why?” Ruth cried.
“We have to go out there. I can’t see well enough from inside to aim properly,” Duncan called.
To Ruth, going outside was preposterous. The gunfire sounded horrifying inside the house. To think of anybody being brave or foolish enough to want to venture outside was simply ludicrous. “Nobody can go out there.”
Elias smiled. “We know what we are doing.”
“I know that,” Ruth snorted. “The problem is that they know what you will be doing too. This house is being watched from all sides, Elias. The second you open the door they will shoot you. Nobody can go out there.”
“Agreed,” Duncan called. “We stay inside.”
The conversation was interspersed by loud blasts of gunfire which raged all around them. Ruth clamped her shaking hands over her ears to try to block out the noise, which thundered around them so badly that she felt the floor beneath her vibrate. It was difficult to know what to do. She wanted nothing more than the peace of her old life back but was helpless to know how to make it all stop.
“Why? Why are they doing this?” she cried several minutes later when she couldn’t stand the noise anymore.
“Rointon wants to pretend that he can control us if not kill us whenever he wants to.”
“He has a lot of people helping him,” Ruth warned.
“We have the advantage because we are protected in here.” Elias shot two more men. Their dull cries and the cessation of the gunfire being aimed at his window was enough proof that they posed no further threat to him. Sti
ll, Elias kept watching the landscape and trees move as more men stepped forward to take their places. “The man has a veritable army at his disposal,” he breathed more to himself than to his colleagues.
“How long will it be before your boss sends reinforcements?” Ruth asked.
Elias shook his head. “I have no idea. It might be a day or so, it might be a week.”
“We can’t survive for that long,” Ruth protested.
“Which is why we are going to retreat to the safe house in Mivverford. Men from another team nearby are guarding the place while we are away but there aren’t enough men spare at the moment to help us here as well.”
“We are going to take this battle to Rointon’s house,” Al warned from the doorway. “We have the locals in Mivverford already telling us where Rointon is going. We also have Sir Hugo sending reinforcements to that house. We can wait for help there."
“What about Morgan? Will he be able to make the journey?” Duncan asked.
As if by magic, Morgan appeared in the hallway behind Al. “I am not going to lie about here when I can be helping. I may not be able to crawl around in undergrowth right now, but I can keep guard over Lucy and Martha and protect the safe house in Mivverford while you are hunting Rointon,” he informed them.
Al clapped him on the shoulder. “If you think you are up to it, we will move out just as soon as we have this lot dealt with. As soon as they realise that we have left here they will know where to find us. What we don’t want is to be ambushed out in the open while you are injured.”
“We have to hurry. Rointon may target Marth and Lucy because he knows that we are here,” Jarvis said.
“Do we go now?” Elias asked. He looked at Ruth and didn’t need to think about placing a comforting hand on her back. She instantly stepped toward him, silently seeking his solid support. “Can you and Maud pack what you are going to need?”
“Well, I suppose so,” Ruth replied nervously although the thought of going outside while Rointon lurked in the bushes was simply horrifying. She struggled to know what to say to the quite capable men from the Star Elite. While she was dithering and doubting herself, they didn’t seem to have any doubt that they would reach Mivverford unharmed.
“We have to. We can’t leave Lucy and Martha by themselves any longer than we absolutely have to. I know they have your friends with them, but they won’t be able to defend the house against that lot,” Maud announced with a nod at the window. She looked as worried as Ruth felt but there was a steely determination in her eyes that warned Ruth that she was furious about what Rointon was doing. “We will be ready soon.”
Ruth didn’t doubt that neither of them were going to return. They weren’t going to feel safe in the cottage after this, and it wasn’t just because they didn’t know who they could trust in the village. This was no longer their home; a sanctuary; a place where they could feel secure.
“It will be all right,” Elias assured her quietly before releasing several more shots when he saw two figures separate from the trees and start running toward the cottage.
While Elias and the men fired at the enemy, Ruth packed her belongings into an old, battered travelling trunk. It wasn’t until she had finished that she looked down at it and something dawned on her. “How are we going to transport this to the safe house?”
Elias grinned. “Leave it to us. We will take it with us when we go.”
Ruth was full of questions, but Elias was distracted by the attackers outside again.
“It feels like this has been going on for hours,” she moaned when the gunfire eventually started to become sporadic.
“It has been fifteen minutes,” Elias replied with a rueful smile. “They have lost enough men to get the message. They will retreat eventually. What we have to do is leave before they can regroup and attack us again.”
Several more minutes passed before the gunfire stopped completely. Eventually, Elias closed the shutter and ambled over to her. Ruth’s heart pounded. She could smell sulphur on him. It was a stark reminder that his life was dangerous, but rather than be horrified by it, or see it as a warning that she should avoid him, Ruth was oddly relieved by it. It was a reminder that life was precious, that men like Rointon walked the streets every day and could destroy lives whenever they chose to and needed to be vanquished. It was because of the men from the Star Elite, men like Elias, that Rointon and his thugs weren’t allowed to get away with destroying innocent people’s lives whenever they wanted to. Justice had to be served and when it came to hardened criminals that was never going to be easy.
When Elias stepped toward her, the atmosphere between them became charged with an energy that was so tangible, Ruth expected it to be visible. But she couldn’t see it because she couldn’t take her eyes off him. Elias was the centre of her world.
“I am glad you stayed,” she whispered because if she had been alone in the house with Maud, Ruth knew that she would be dead by now.
“I am too,” he replied honestly. “I am glad that you came to save me.”
“I am too,” she repeated.
“God, you are stunningly beautiful,” he breathed and watched her gaze fall to the centre of his chest in embarrassment.
Because he wouldn’t allow her to shy away from the truth, Elias tipped her chin up until Ruth was forced to look at him. His eyes met hers but only briefly. His gaze slid compellingly to her lips. He couldn’t resist the temptation she put before him. When he lowered his head this time, though, this was no brief suggestion of a kiss like before. His lips possessed, claimed, and savoured hers with a need that was forceful. Every square inch of muscle and flesh pressed against her when he gathered her into his strong arms and held her tightly. Ruth sucked in a breath, but it came out of his lungs. She clung to him because she knew that he could also feel the fine tremors that she suspected were coursing through them both. She tried to decide if they were hers but realised that the hand that cupped the back of her head was trembling a little too. Eventually, she realised that they were both shaken by what was materialising between them; what neither of them could deny existed.
This adoration, this fierce attraction, suddenly flared to life and created an essence, a solid presence, which surrounded them both and entwined them both in a compelling need to savour, touch, and sample with the rawness that was their emotions. Neither of them could deny the attraction that compelled them to step as close as their clothing would allow. His long arms wrapped fiercely around her, tugging her closer until there wasn’t any space between them. He savoured her curves nestled against him; the way each dip and hollow seemed to fit snugly against him. She tested and explored and satisfied her curiosity. Ruth had no idea if they would have the opportunity to enjoy a moment like this again. As soon as they reached the safe house the men from the Star Elite had work to do. Elias wanted to enjoy every precious second alone with her because he wasn’t sure what the future held in store for either of them, or how long it would be before they could be alone together like this again. There would be even more people around once the reinforcements arrived at the safe house. There would be little time alone together then, mostly because he would be out hunting for Rointon with the rest of the men.
Despite niggling doubts still prodding her, Ruth remained where she was. This was the first time in her life that she had ever had anybody show her true affection and made her feel as if she were precious. Elias made her feel special, as if nothing else in his world mattered except her. He made her feel infinitely feminine, wanton, and attractive in a way that she had ever felt before. It was an unusual experience to find herself the focus of a man’s desire. Ruth revelled in every second of it.
Eventually, though, Elias became aware of the sound of dragging coming from the hallway and the others in the house moving about. He knew that someone could appear in the doorway at any second, and so reluctantly stepped back, but only so that he could look down into her eyes.
“This is only just starting,” he warned. “We have to
see where this is going to take us.”
Ruth heard the fierceness of his tone and wondered what had made him so angry. His gaze was almost hard as was the hushed tone of his voice. She shivered at the shadows that appeared in his eyes, which studied every inch of her face intently as if searching for something. Ruth knew there was nowhere to hide. He could read every emotion that she was experiencing right now. She was sure that it was written on her face for the world, for him, to see but didn’t bother to hide it. She didn’t need to hide anything from Elias. Deep inside, in a place that was hidden from the world, she knew that he would never willingly hurt her. He wasn’t the kind of cold, callous man that took whatever he wanted and left whenever life became too challenging. Elias was strong, practical, capable, and determined. After what she had witnessed him do during the gun battle, he wasn’t afraid to stand up for himself or the people who mattered to him. In her eyes, he was a hero. Her hero.
“I don’t want to stay here,” she breathed. “I don’t care where this is going to take us. I must stay with you. I cannot stay here and live the life I had. Not now. Maybe not ever.” Ruth wasn’t sure what she was agreeing to, but she knew instinctively that if she was beside Elias, everything would be all right.
“Good.” Elias didn’t say as much to her, but he suspected that life in the village of Riddlewood wasn’t going to be the same for any of the villagers after this, especially given that some were dead now, and whoever wasn’t was going to gaol.
“What now?” Ruth almost dreaded asking.
Elias smiled at her. “Now, you have to do what I ask of you without question. You must trust me. We will get you out of here. Just go along with whatever we tell you to do without asking questions. It means that we can move that bit faster and can explain everything to you when this is all over.”
Ruth knew that this was going to mean she had to trust Elias with her life, but she had no qualms about doing it. If anybody was going to protect her from not just Rointon but the men she had called neighbours too, it was going to be the Star Elite.