Dressed only in a white camisole, ruffle-trimmed white bloomers, and a corset, Contessa held onto the bulky rope as it swayed dangerously against the gray stone wall, inching her way down one knot at a time. This was insane, he thought, as he stared up at her, terrified of taking his gaze anywhere else, terrified she might slip, terrified someone could come up from behind him. But he hoped if anyone meant to accost him, he’d be able to catch the movement out of the corner of his eye. His left hand dragged through his hair, and he noticed how sweaty his scalp and forehead were. Christian swiped the back of his hand across his face. It felt like hours had passed and she’d only descended about a third of the way down.
Contessa’s hair had been braided but the exertion of her task and the wind buffeting her had loosened the honeyed tresses and the free strands began to drift around her face and shoulders.
As the sun sank below the horizon, it became harder for him to see her as she became a moving shape of white against a darkened background. He suspected she could be getting cold as a shudder worked its way through his own body. With the chill of dusk, combined with his sweat, and with the addition of the biting wind sweeping up from the channel, he was suffering too. But she had it far worse, for she wasn’t dressed in layers of wool and linen as he was.
“Oh, Contessa—” Christian silenced himself when a small squeak came from above.
Had she slipped? Straining his eyes, he breathed a sigh of relief to see she was more than halfway down and still holding on.
“Hurry, Tessa...no, don’t rush it...it’s too hazardous,” he whispered. After measuring her movement, which had actually halted for a moment, he stole one pass of his surroundings. All appeared to be clear. His eyes swung back her way and her pale form was again descending at a steady pace.
He shook his head. Such a brave thing to do! Such a foolish thing to do! But undeniably, he was quite impressed with what she’d accomplished all alone. Truly amazing, and when she got to the bottom, he was going to paddle her behind for causing his heart to stop, restart, and stop again....
She got to what looked like a white wedding gown, which she practically blended into, except for her hair, and something went wrong. A slightly louder squeak or a faint scream reached his ears along with the sound of rending fabric. It seemed the waist seams of the gown were not sturdy enough to hold her weight. Christian positioned himself beneath her, his heart coming to another halt, because while she’d come quite a distance, she was still too far up for her to survive a fall or for him to catch her.
“Don’t let go!” he muttered as loudly as he dared.
She did not release her grip, but the threads did. Another ripping sound was heard and she dropped about half a foot. Her pace increased as she tried to lower herself to the next set of knots when the seams ripped again, jostling her enough this time that she lost her hold.
With his heart lodged in his throat, Christian watched in horror as she plummeted toward him. But at just about ten feet above his head, she suddenly stopped and began drifting instead of dropping. Only when he realized she was dressed as a medieval bride did he comprehend that she’d just turned ghostly.
He still couldn’t swallow the lump lodged in his windpipe. It seemed she would be saved, until just as suddenly she returned to solid form and again sailed toward him.
Christian held his hands out, but when she slammed into his chest, he was thrown backward with the force of it.
“Oof,” he grunted for the second time that night. Struggling to take the brunt of the fall, Christian locked his arms around her and waited for things to settle.
Yet she didn’t settle down at all. “No!” she cried.
His hand came over her mouth before she alerted the entire village of her escape. She screamed against his palm and wriggled to get away from him, kicking at his shins and thrusting her elbows back into his ribs. While she fought, he used his strength to subdue her and spoke into her hair, “Shhh, Contessa, it’s me, it’s Christian. Please settle down.”
Apparently she heard him because she went still and quiet.
He turned her in his arms until she faced him.
A sob tumbled from her lips and she hugged him, burying her face into his shoulder for a moment or two until she finally lifted her head and looked at him, her fingertips caressing his whiskered cheek. “How?”
“That’s what I would like to know,” he ground out as he grasped her arms perhaps a little too tightly. “What you just did was far too dangerous! How could you take such a risk, Tessa? I’m here for you.”
But when she flinched and tried to pull away, he frowned and looked more closely at her bare arms. There, barely visible in the diminishing light, were many shadowy welts dotting her pale flesh. Mouth hanging open, Christian matched his gaze to hers. That’s when he noticed her red-rimmed eyes. “What did they do to you?” A need for violence rose up from the darkest parts of his soul. “What did he do to you?”
He felt her chest shudder against his with a wobbly breath. “They pinched me.”
“They?”
“The maids.”
“Why?” he demanded.
“I argued about putting on the dress.”
“The wedding gown?” It wasn’t meant as a question but it came out that way.
“Yes,” she said.
“What else? Tell me everything, Tessa. What did he do that drove you to this?”
“It wasn’t what he did, but what he said he would do.” Her face screwed up with distress, tears leaked from her eyes and dropped onto his neck. “I had to get away. Just had to...”
He brushed his thumbs over her eyelids, gathering the remainder of tears from her lashes. “Tell me what he said.”
She shook her head, and then chewed her lip a moment before she said, “I c-cannot re-repeat it.”
The length of her practically nude body trembled against his and as she released her lip he noted the same wobbling in her plush mouth. While he was secretly savoring the feel of her with nothing more than a bit of linen between his hand and her skin as he rubbed her back, he knew he had to get her more covered. His gaze slid past her to the rope of clothing, but while she had fallen, it had remained dangling by a few threads far out of reach.
Christian rolled upright, then rose to his feet, taking her with him. “You’ll die of the chill. Did you really plan on escaping in your undergarments and a pair of shoes?” he asked, tugging his arms out of his coat.
“I didn’t have time.” He slipped her arms into the sleeves, the cuffs falling well below her fingers. He rolled them up and fastened every button. “It’s warm.” A small smile lifted her pink mouth.
His eyes slid downward, and while the coat fell past her knees, her legs remained uncovered. Christian gathered her shoes and placed them on her feet, commenting, “And how did you expect to get away from here wearing a pair of flimsy slippers?”
Chapter 31
Fight for Flight
She didn’t answer because she was unwilling to share the fact that she hadn’t really considered it, nor did the thought even cross her mind. She simply had to escape Dominic, no matter what the risk. Yes, even if she died in the attempt...what he’d said had been so horrible.
“We’d better go before they discover—” he began.
“Contessa!”
Their heads swung up to the window, where Dominic stood, leaning over the ledge with one fist upon the rope. It seemed he couldn’t see them just yet and Christian startled her when he suddenly caught her about the waist and dove for the shadows directly beneath the tower window. Once there, she understood why, low vines covered them from view.
Christian then took her hand into his and pulled her along the edges of the garden toward the gap in the hedge. She stumbled as they moved into the thick undergrowth carpeting the woods. “Can you run?” he asked? “I don’t think we’ll make it if I have to carry you.”
Fear still drove her. “Yes,” she said, willing to do anything. She didn’t care that he
r limbs already ached from climbing down that rope. She didn’t care if she froze to death. She didn’t care if the brambles sliced up her legs. She only wanted to flee this place.
With the sound of hoof beats pounding the earth, she knew they were going to fail. He’ll catch us as easily as he caught me before, she thought unhappily. “He’s coming,” she whispered.
Christian looked back toward the hedge and she could see by the way his face tightened with concern that he could hear it too.
“This way,” was all he said before leading her to a large ancient-looking tree and tucking them between the overgrown roots which had worked their way out of the soil and along the ground like a great motionless sea creature. With her back against the bark, he leaned into her gently and uttered another string of Gaelic words.
“What was that?” she asked in a hushed voice that was further muffled into the linen of his black shirtsleeves.
“A masking spell combined with a confusion spell.”
“He’ll see through it.”
“We can only hope he doesn’t.” And he gave her fingers a reassuring squeeze.
She jumped when Dominic’s horse cleared the hedge with ease. Even though they had made it farther away than she had the other night, they remained within plain view, and her heart pounded loudly inside her head.
Unable to watch, Contessa buried her face into Christian’s back and listened to the sound of the fierce animal stomp around them, closer and closer.
Contessa’s fingers curled into the fabric of Christian’s shirt when Dominic growled, “Where are you, you rebellious wench! I promise that what I threatened before will be far worse if you do not reveal yourself.”
Christian slid his arms back and held her. The silent gesture was as comforting as she figured he meant it to be.
Moments ticked on and it sounded like Dominic was terribly close. She gnawed at her lip until she tasted blood. He spoke again, “I’ll find you, and when I do, you’ll regret it. You’ll regret embarrassing me like this.”
After another lengthy amount of time, the sounds of his search ceased and it seemed like he’d returned to the castle.
Quiet held her heart captive for a while longer before Christian finally moved away and tugged her free of the roots. They traveled farther into the forest. “Where are we going?” she asked. “Isn’t England across the channel?”
“It is. We’re going north to Dover Straits to cross.”
“How far is that?”
“Too far to walk in one night. We’re stopping soon.”
“I don’t need to rest,” she lied. Her arms and legs trembled with fatigue. “We must keep going.” She may have said the words with feeling, but they came out so weak there was no commitment behind them.
“He won’t find us,” he replied.
“You do not know him. He is relentless!”
“Contessa, you’re about to collapse.”
That was something she could not bring herself to care about, getting as far away as possible from that sadistic man was far more important. “I’m fine!”
He wasn’t buying it. Perhaps it was because she’d stumbled when she said it. Christian let go of her hand and dropped to his knees next to a pile of leaves at the base of a tree trunk. From the bracken he produced a rucksack. From that he produced a blanket which he wrapped around her. “The masking spell worked. The blackguard looked right at us, but he did not see us.”
“What if he figures it out? He took all of Tabitha’s spells from me. He’s powerful, dangerous, and too cunning to be underestimated.”
After gathering her to his chest, he whispered in a gentle tone, “Darling, if we keep going you’ll swoon and I cannot carry you in that state the distance we need to go. I had wanted to bring a horse, but we feared Dominic would hurt you if it were discovered while I attempted to free you. You’ve accomplished a great deal tonight, but you’re tired from the effort. Trust me, your father and Tabitha have prepared me with spells and skills I did not have before. In fact” –he patted the sword slung about his hips, a boyish smirk took to his mouth— “I have your father’s blade, and he trained me in the way of fey sword fighting.”
Her eyes rounded. “You-you found them?”
“They found me and told me where they were.”
“Are they free?”
“No, but since I’m human, I could go through the mist to their castle. They still cannot escape it.”
“Are they well?”
“They looked quite well to me.” His expression fell without warning and he pulled away to lead her to a fallen log. “But there’s a lot I need to tell you.”
She sat down, tucking the blanket between her knees. “What is it?”
“First, however—” He muttered a few words that sounded Welsh and a green fire rose before her in the grass growing there. “Tabitha taught this to me. ‘Tis a fire without wood that cannot be seen, will not produce smoke, but will warm us both quite thoroughly.”
He then moved toward her, lifted her from the log, sat down in front of it and settled her upon his lap. Once she was situated and the heat from the flames reached through the wool covering her, heating her, he asked, “Are you warm yet?”
She nodded but he didn’t seem convinced because he carefully pushed a hand into the blanket, nudged off her slipper and wrapped fingers around her toes. Only then did he seem satisfied as he reached into his satchel and pulled out a small glass bottle.
“What is that?” she asked.
“A salve for your wounds.”
The cuts along her legs did burn, but modesty made her tug the blanket tighter around herself. It’s true that he had seen her in her under things earlier, but there’d been nothing she could have done about that. “Christian, I’m fine. Tell me about....”
“In a minute.” Feeling her cheeks heat, she fought him without success as he drew her leg from beneath the wool, took off the lid and dipped his fingers into something that smelled like mint, lavender, and eucalyptus.
The moment the cooling cream touched her scrapes she relaxed because it soothed the bite from the brambles and branches that had ravaged her poor flesh as they ran. After applying the salve to every abrasion on her shins and ankles, he said, “This will work for those welts on your arms, too.”
Again she protested when he reached for the buttons of her—his coat. “Oh, no. Really, I’m much better now. And,” she added, when she saw her first argument wasn’t working, “I’m getting cold again.” As adamantly as she could, Tessa tucked herself back in and faked a shiver. “Please,” she tried, batting her lashes at him, “tell me.”
Christian flashed, what she decided was, a deliberate dimple. Apparently he suspected her fib, but only said, “Very well,” as he stuffed the pot of salve back into his bag.
That handsome dimple disappeared as fast as it had appeared and she realized the direction of his thoughts had shifted to a place he didn’t like. He exhaled as though what he was about to say would come as a shock. Christian brushed a few strands of her hair behind her ear and then told her all that her parents had told him.
Moments later she found herself curled against his chest weeping for her mother and father, weeping for the time lost between them, but tears of joy mingled with the sad for she now knew she’d never been dead. And she understood why she still could not remember everything about herself, including magic she knew she possessed but could not access even now.
“King James gave his consent,” said Christian.
The comment caused her to lift her head in surprise.
“He gave his consent for us to marry.”
She felt a smile bloom within her heart as it began to grow until it reached her lips.
His eyes darkened with something that whispered of love but burned with need as he gathered her chin between his thumb and forefinger. Angling her mouth closer, Christian covered her lips with his. The caress defined tender as though he’d invented the maneuver. And it was the kind of kiss that ma
de the crickets fall silent in awe, the owls hoot with jealousy, and the trees weep with joy.
At least that is how she perceived it.
His fingers left her face and slid into her hair, holding her mouth against his and she was lost within his consuming touch.... After he’d kissed her senseless for quite some time, she enjoyed a comfortable sleep cuddled against Christian’s warmth and strength.
Chapter 32
Unforeseen Ever After
Christian tucked a hand into her blanket to see if her fingers and toes were still warm. He smiled when he discovered they were rather toasty. She’d felt like ice before, which had worried him. Not to mention how her body shook with the effort it cost her to keep up with him for as long as she had. He knew she hadn’t realized he noticed how tightly she clung to him as they’d trudged through the tangled forest, and how her legs barely held her. His fingers moved along her cheek. Pleased with the color in her face, which had been as pale as death earlier, he tried to ignore how his stomach rolled with concern at the memory of seeing her look so weak and ashen, her washed-out face practically glowing in the filtered moonlight. After enjoying the sight of her sleeping in his arms for a moment or two, he attempted to wake her with a kiss.
She moaned and stirred but only curled herself in closer to his body.
The sun was not yet visible, but the glow of morning was brightening the sky with a gradient cast of azure. The smell of rotting leaves, bark, and dirt permeated the air. The world also smelled wet, and he noted with a grimace, that his trousers felt rather damp. Christian extinguished the fire with one word and stretched out his legs. Again she shifted and complained with a faint mumble about his change in position. His stiff muscles protested as well. “Contessa, wake up. We need to get moving.”
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