by Eve Silver
She stared at the rim, knowing his lips had touched that spot, his tongue had licked away the last drops of wine.
Her pulse banged a hard rhythm as she slowly extended her hand and accepted the wine. She took a tentative sip. The brew was smooth and rich, and she took a deeper drink, swirling her tongue around the neck.
Raising her gaze, she found him watching her, his eyes dark pools, heavy lidded, assessing.
“Have you had enough?” His voice was deeper, more gravelly than before.
She nodded and held the bottle out toward him. He took it, and after setting it aside, he snuffed the lamp.
“Good night, Jane. Sleep well.” With those softly spoken words Mr. Warrick turned on his side away from her, and within seconds the slow, even cadence of his breathing told her he was asleep, while she lay on her back, wide-eyed in the dark.
* * *
The morning sun woke her. Jane stretched and marveled at the strange dream that had inhabited the darkest hours of the night. A most beautiful man, a most wondrous kiss...
She opened her eyes and let out a sharp squeak. No dream then, for he stood at the foot of the bed watching her, bare chest peeking from between the open edges of his shirt, his jaw darkened by dark gold stubble. The sight of him in such dishabille unsettled her, for he was all the more perfect in his rough and ungroomed state.
“I must leave for the span of a day,” he said. “Stay in this room. Keep the door locked. Meals will be brought to you.”
A spark of elation flared as she registered his meaning. He would leave her here. Alone. But as quickly as the thought of escape flickered and roared to life, it was doused by harsh reality.
There was nowhere for her to go.
“Do you not fear that I will flee?” she asked, her tone resentful.
“Flee?” He made no attempt to hide his incredulity. “There is nowhere you can go that I will not find you, sweet Jane. You are mine. Bought and paid for. And what is mine, I keep.”
He had said those words to the men who had threatened her last night.
“Please do not call me that,” she whispered. “Sweet Jane.”
“Why not?” He looked at her mouth, and she raised her hand to cover her lips. “You are sweet.”
Resting one booted foot against the seat of the chair, he tugged up his trouser leg. With swift ease he fastened the leather dagger sheath in place, then pushed the chair aside and strode across the room. The door closed firmly behind him, the sound of the lock turning barely audible against the noises of the wakening inn.
Jane scuttled from the bed and dragged on her dress. She crossed to the washstand and was surprised to find a tin of Partridge’s Peppermint Tooth Powder sitting next to the pitcher of fresh water. She retrieved her own tooth powder from her portmanteau and quickly performed her ablutions, her eyes constantly straying back to the tin on the washstand.
She supposed that even a monster had cause to use tooth powder. For a moment, it made him seem remarkably human.
After washing her face, she stepped to the window, pulling the edge of the curtain aside. His coach was at the ready in the courtyard, but there was no sign of Mr. Warrick. She refused to acknowledge the tiny niggle of disappointment that she would not catch a glimpse of him before he left. Suddenly, the door swung open and she whirled about, dropping her hold on the curtain.
Mr. Warrick strode back into the room, a full plate of food in one hand, a thick tome in the other. She watched him warily as he tossed the book on the bed and offered the plate to her.
“I’ve brought you a book...” He paused, frowned, then continued, “You do read?”
She looked at the book and then back to his face. “Yes, my mother taught me.”
“And how did she come to know?”
“She was not always an innkeeper’s wife. Once, she was the twelfth daughter of a country squire,” Jane said softly, and then she lifted her chin a notch in challenge. “How did you learn to read?”
A stillness came over him. “I was not always what I am today. Once, I was the son of a mother who taught me my letters.” His tone turned brusque. “I will likely return by dusk. For your own safety, do not leave this chamber unescorted.” He studied her carefully. “I mean what I say, Jane. The moor has hidden dangers. It would give me no pleasure to pull your corpse from the marsh.”
As Jem and Robert had pulled the corpse from the sea...
With that warning, he left, and Jane stood staring at the locked door long after he was gone. Finally, her gaze strayed to the book on the bed. What manner of servant was she, that her master brought her breakfast and entertainment to ease the passage of the hours?
Upon finishing her morning meal and tidying the room, Jane lifted the book that Mr. Warrick had left and settled in the chair by the window. The Mysteries of Udolpho. The title beckoned, and she began to read. Falling under the spell of Count Montoni and the castle of Udolpho, she did not notice the time as she sank deeper into the story and the rather frightening world the tale divulged.
After a time, she paused and rose to stretch her legs, wondering at Mr. Warrick’s purpose in leaving her this chilling story to occupy her hours. There was a certain dark irony to the deed.
Hawker appeared mid-afternoon to take her on a lengthy stroll outdoors. The sky was clear, the air brisk, but the environs were far from welcoming. Despite having been to the New Inn once before with her father, Jane had never noticed until now how harsh and bleak and vast was the landscape about the place. On all sides the inn was encircled by stark and barren terrain that rolled endlessly to the east and west, and in the distance, great hills rose to meet the heavens.
Behind the New Inn were a chicken run and a small vegetable garden that invited a wave of melancholy as she thought of her own garden at home.
Turning away, she let her gaze roam the gray stone wall that surrounded the yard, the stable set at the far end, and the drinking trough that sat in the center. Everything was gray and unwelcoming.
Jane sighed. Perhaps her impressions were clouded by the story she had been reading and by her own private turmoil. Surely there were good folk about, farmers and hard-working souls.
After they had walked a reasonable distance, Hawker pointed at a granite crag that rose above the marsh. “That there is Kilmar Tor.” He glanced at her, his gaze dropping to her feet. “You all right then?”
Her limp was pronounced this afternoon, her muscles aching from the lengthy carriage ride the previous day.
“I am quite well, thank you. The more I walk, the less stiff I feel.” She took several steps to support her assertion.
“Not that way, miss.” Hawker caught her arm and gently turned her direction. “Marsh lies that way. Marsh, and death.”
Something in his tone made her shudder. “Whose death?”
Hawker sent her a wry smile. “Mine, nearly. A boy can easily lose his way, especially after dark. I thought my direction was good, bred in my bones because I’m a country lad, but I was wrong. There I was, walking along, whistling a happy tune, and next thing I knew, I was up to my arse... er, beg your pardon, miss... up to my hips in slime and wet.”
Staring out at the grass stems of the marsh where they waved softly in the breeze, masking the danger beneath the surface, Jane could see it in her mind’s eye, see Hawker struggling against the sucking mud, trapped in what threatened to be his murky grave.
“How did you manage to pull yourself free?”
“I didn’t. It was His Lor— I mean, Mr. Warrick what pulled me free. And him a stranger to me. He waded right in, bold as you please, and let me tell you, I was down to my shoulders by then”—he shuddered—”and he grabs my shirt and hauls me out. I’ve been with him ever since. He was captain; I was his cabin boy, then worked my way up to mate.”
Captain. The appellation caught her attention as much as Hawker’s story. So now she had two more pieces of the puzzle that was Aidan Warrick. He had been the captain of a ship. And he was a man who had risked
his own life to save a boy he did not know.
Strange how pieces of the solution only made the riddle more confusing.
Chapter 6
Two more days passed much as the first. Jane was allowed only the limited freedom of Hawker’s wardenship. They walked on the moor, talked of insignificant things, and Jane was left to wonder why the duties of a bondservant were not assigned to her and what it was that kept Mr. Warrick so very busy during the daylight hours.
At night, he came to share a meal and to sleep by her side. Lying next to him with the layers of sheets between them, she bluntly, and foolishly, asked again what his business was here at the New Inn. Mr. Warrick stared at her for a length of time, his mouth tense, his eyes narrowed, and she felt a flicker of unease as the silence stretched and grew. There was something in his eyes... something tormented.
When he finally doused the light and bid her roll over and sleep, she shifted to her side, moving to the very far edge of the bed. She lay there thinking back to the first night at the New Inn, the first night she had shared a bed with him.
The night he had kissed her.
What terrible lunacy overtook her that she longed to roll over and touch him, to lift her face to his, to feel the hard press of his mouth against hers once more? This wanting of him was a dark and frightening thing, for he was in a position of great power, and she was in a position of none.
Yet, he had chosen to kiss her only once and then press her no further, and as she called to mind every nuance of that kiss, the warmth of his mouth and the luscious taste of him, she had the horrid thought that she had far more to fear from herself than from him.
Sleep that night was a long time coming.
* * *
The next day was a repeat of the others, and Jane felt a growing disquiet, fed by her unfulfilled hours. She longed for some task to busy her hands and mind. Hawker took her out for a lengthy walk, but her pointed inquiries were met with evasion of a most obvious nature.
Upon her return, she took up the novel Mr. Warrick had left her and read for the remainder of the afternoon.
Night fell, a blunt and heavy press of darkness. Alone in the chamber, Jane closed her book, resting her palm flat against the leather tome, her concentration broken by the clatter of wheels on stone. Some instinct whispered that ’twas no farmer’s wagon come to the inn.
She pinched the flame of her candle and crossed to the window in time to see a covered cart roll to a halt, reminiscent of the wagon she had seen that first night. The driver climbed down, peered round into the shadows that laced the yard, and finally strode into the inn. Such caution seemed vastly out of place for a simple driver of a simple wagon.
Two figures separated from the gloom to make their way furtively to the heavily laden cart. A shock of white hair stood out like a beacon against the black sky.
Davey. The man who had attacked her that first night.
With her heart tripping a frantic rhythm, Jane watched Davey’s stealthy progress. She thought the companion slinking at his heels might be Gaby, though there was no distinguishing thing that marked his identity.
Fear and anger mixed in a glutinous brew, stirred by a slew of terrifying memories. She could almost feel their hands on her again, sense their ghastly intent. Bile rose in her throat as she thought of what might have happened if Mr. Warrick had not come when he did.
Her savior.
The man who had brought her into danger in the first place.
As if conjured by her thoughts, a third form glided from the shadows. Tall and broad, with his black coat billowing about him, he was unmistakable. Jane pressed deeper into the cover of the velvet curtain, her clenched fingers crushing the soft cloth. Mr. Warrick strode toward the two shadowy forms that slunk about the wagon, his steps sure, his posture that of a man in control. She could not hear the exchange, but Davey and Gaby appeared belligerent, argumentative, the tone of their voices carrying through the glass, if not their words.
Mr. Warrick advanced as they retreated. Davey lunged, and Jane gasped as she caught the glint of what she thought might be a blade in his hand. Bodies collided. There was a scuffle, dark forms blending and shifting in the night shadows, limbs flailing.
A single strangled cry drifted upward to raise the fine hairs at her nape.
One figure lurched away from the others in a crooked dance. Drunk. Or hurt. Jane pressed her face to the glass, lured by the terrifying scene, unable to tear her gaze away.
The shadows parted, and two men moved off, the one supporting the other, the wagon left untouched. She had no doubt as to the identity of the man who remained behind.
Seconds crawled past as Jane pressed her shoulder to the cold wall, her thoughts in disarray. Mr. Warrick turned his face toward the inn and stepped into a halo of light radiating from a window on the lower floor. It was then that Jane saw the unmistakable shape in his hand: his knife, held with the confidence of a man who knew what he was about.
She stared in dreadful fascination, horrified by the possibilities that knife promised.
He took out a handkerchief and slowly, so slowly, he wiped the blade, a solid stroke on one side and then the other, the movements both graceful and awful.
With a ragged exhalation she dragged the curtain shut as she stumbled back. What had she witnessed? A man defending himself from an attacker, a drunken man subdued, or something far more sinister?
Despite the facade of civility he presented, Aidan Warrick was a mystery, and a threat. She would do well to remember that she had no idea what he was capable of. No idea at all. So she reminded herself again and again, whispering the litany aloud as she paced to and fro and rubbed her palms along her upper arms, unable to chase away the chill. Only when Mr. Warrick pushed open the door and entered the room a few moments later did she still her frenzied march.
“Good evening, Jane.” He looked at her quizzically as he used the sole of his boot to push the door shut behind him, his hands occupied with a tray.
Tormented by suspicion and wariness, appalled by the inexplicable burst of joy that blossomed at the sight of him, she merely nodded in reply. For a moment, she questioned her own sanity. She must see this man for exactly what he was, a criminal, a smuggler, mayhap a wrecker and murderer.
A man to fear.
A man who brought her dinner.
Madness. Madness. ’Twas the only explanation for the confusion she felt when he was near.
He held out the tray toward her, and she wondered how he had collected a meal so quickly. Perhaps he had requested it before he went out into the night with his frightening demeanor and his knife.
With a sigh, she took the tray from him and set it down on the table, the rich scent of well seasoned mutton stew and fresh bread flavoring the air.
“Good evening,” she replied at last, watching him doff his coat and hang it on the peg.
He again followed the ritual of the previous nights, removing his pistol and his knife. Her gaze followed his movements as he placed the sheathed blade on the table near the bed.
If she drew nigh and examined the piece, would she find it stained red with blood? A shudder crawled along her spine. She raised her gaze to find him studying her with narrowed eyes.
Flustered, she set her hands to laying out the plates from the tray, and soon they were sitting facing each other across the table by the window.
“Are you enjoying the book?” Mr. Warrick asked some moments later.
“Yes, thank you.” Such civil conversation.
Jane poked at a potato, and then a carrot. What would he say if she asked him about the strange and frightening scene she had just witnessed? Would he tell her the truth?
He leaned forward and filled her glass with wine.
“What do you think of Emily?” he asked.
Jane stared at him. She had spent the past moments in an agony of uncertainty, wondering if she had just witnessed him gutting a man, while he had spent that time pondering literature.
“She value
s life’s simple beauties, and that I can understand,” she said at length, thinking about Emily, the heroine of The Mysteries of Udolpho, thinking, too, of Emily’s trials and tribulations, perhaps a metaphor for her own. But there any similarity ended. “She does tend to faint a great deal.”
Mr. Warrick let out a laugh, the sound brief and clear, as though startled from him. Jane closed her eyes, pleased by the cadence of it, perplexed by her pleasure. When she opened her eyes, she found him watching her, his mouth curved in a small smile.
That mouth had kissed hers. Warm, firm lips. The delicious thrust of his tongue.
She dropped her gaze to her plate, annoyed both by her inability to expunge the episode from her thoughts and by the secret truth that she had enjoyed his kiss, that she desperately wanted him to kiss her again, despite all her rationalizations and silent admonitions why he must not.
“She does faint a great deal,” he agreed. “I found her honorable.”
“Do you admire that? Her deep sense of honor?” Jane asked. “You do not seem a man to value morality or honor—” She stumbled to a halt as she realized what she had implied. That he was not a man to value honor, that he was not a man of principle. “I—”
He made a dismissive gesture, stilling any apology she might have offered. “Morality,” he mused. “No, I have no time for the social morality imposed by a tainted civilization. But I am not a man who equates false morality with honor. Let us just say I have my own personal code.”
“Does that mean that you choose to live outside the bounds of civilization?” Was this a confession to his illegal deeds? Yet, he implied that he was honorable, measured by some secret standard he did not choose to define.
“It means I have no patience for social mores.” His tone ended the conversation.
They finished their meal in silence. At length, Mr. Warrick rose and crossed the room to take up his pistol and his knife. Jane stared at his broad back, thinking that she had somehow offended him deeply. She almost laughed aloud at the absurdity of it; she questioned the honor of a man she suspected was a smuggler and thief, and he would take her to task for it. Worse, she took herself to task, feeling that somehow she had behaved the churl.