"Do I? Hmmm. I wonder. But it is the beginning of this story that intrigues me at the moment." With alarming agility he navigated his way around and in front of Veronica. "Trust me when I say I intend to hear the full telling of it before this night is through, my lady."
Veronica swallowed, not liking the portentous note of his voice. "Sir?"
"This way, Lady Veronica."
With a familiarity that was unsettling, he took her hand once again in his, leading the way down a slope in the rocks.
"Now see here, sir," Veronica said, struggling over a difficult bit of slippery rock, but tugging her hand free of his nonetheless. "I suddenly do not like the tone of your voice. Though I am grateful for your aid thus far, I feel it gives you no license to demand full-blown explanations from me."
"No?" he inquired, allowing her her head and not reaching for her hand. He continued downward, letting her follow as she would.
"Absolutely not. In fact, sir, if you would but lead me to solid ground and the nearest opening in this pile of ruins, I will be quite all right," she said, with more bravado than she felt.
"Oh you will, will you?"
"Yes."
"Alone."
"Yes, alone."
"In the dark."
"It isn't all that dark," Veronica pointed out. "The moon is nearly fully risen and—"
"Which, by the bye," he cut in, a bit too chattily for Veronica's comfort, "will set the dogs to prowling. They've a nasty habit of that. Like to hunt by moonlight. Seem to have already taken a fancy to your scent, I might add."
Veronica frowned. He was now a good few feet farther down than she. "If this is your unsubtle way of trying to frighten me, sir, I'll have you know I am not a female given to hysterics."
"Aye, I've noticed."
"Nor am I a child."
He glanced back up at her. "I've noted that, too, Lady Veronica."
She decided to ignore that statement. She focused instead on the uneven stones beneath her. "I do believe climbing to the top was easier than getting down."
"This part of abbey is more ruinous than most," he said. "We're now coming closer to the river."
He was moving faster than Veronica. She found it difficult to keep up, for her boots kept slipping and sliding. "Drat," she muttered.
"Are you all right?"
"Yes, yes, fine. No, don't stop. It's just these boots of mine. Blast. I'd thought them suitable enough for my mission here, but then again I did not think to be navigating such treacherous falls of stones. Oh!" she gasped, losing her footing. She slid several feet before catching herself.
"Wait!" her rescuer ordered, growing impatient. "Don't move. I'll come back up and carry you down if I must."
"That will hardly be necessary," Veronica said, managing to retrieve her balance. "I am quite capable, sir, of getting my own self down from here."
But in her haste to hurry and get moving before he dared to carry her bodily down the slope, Veronica again felt her feet slide out from under her.
She wasn't able to catch herself this time. It seemed that every rock beneath her had merely been resting on the slope and was not anchored in any way.
Veronica went skating down, the skirts of her riding habit caught beneath her and baring the length of her legs.
One sharp, jagged bit of rock, though, proved solidly in place, scraping away some of the skin of her left leg as she slid alongside it.
Biting back a cry of pain, Veronica latched on to it, finally coming to a halt.
Her rescuer was instantly beside her, kneeling down. He had full view of her stockinged legs, the left stocking ripped and showing her pale ivory skin.
Veronica's face flamed with embarrassment. "Drat," she muttered, thoroughly appalled at her predicament. She tugged her skirts out from beneath her, quickly trying to smooth them down.
"Drat, indeed," the stranger said, stilling her hands when she would have covered herself. His long, strong fingers skimmed gently down her thigh, stopping just at the point where the rock had left its mark. "You are bleeding, my lady."
"'Tis n-nothing serious, I'm certain. I-I barely feel any pain."
The truth of the matter was, Veronica felt nothing but his hand atop her bared skin. Heaven help her, but it was so large and strong and warm.
Her rescuer seemed not to notice the effect his touch had on her. He was inspecting her injury, his black brows drawing together in a frown she was coming to know all too well.
"It looks to be a nasty cut," he said, surveying the area of her thigh with a critical eye. "It is bleeding a good bit. You might even need a stitch or two to close it."
Veronica's lashes flew up as she turned her attention from his strong, tanned hand to his handsome face. "D-do you think so? I haven't the time for such a bother."
"Well, my lady, it is a bother you have, and whether you like it or not, you'll have to take the time to tend to it I'll lead you straight to your mount and accompany you back to—"
"Really, sir," Veronica cut in, aghast that he was suggesting she leave the ruins. "That is quite out of the question. I must have a look about Fountains. I cannot go back to the village just yet as I have to complete—"
"Bloody hell." It was he who cut in this time. And before Veronica could say or do anything to stop him, he brushed down her skirts, slid one arm beneath her knees, put the other firmly about her waist, then got to his feet holding her aloft in one sweeping movement.
"Sir," Veronica gasped. "I insist that you put me down."
"Insist all you like."
He navigated the last portions of the fall of stones like some ancient god of old thundering down from the very heights of Mt. Olympus.
"Really, "Veronica said, having no choice but to wrap her arms about his neck lest she be banged about in his hold like a limp rag doll. "This is highly embarrassing. I am very capable of walking on my own."
"The devil you are."
They were on solid ground once again, but he did not set her down, nor did he slow his pace any. Veronica held on tighter as he effortlessly carried her across what she soon realized was an expanse of sheep-nubbed grass adorned here and there with a thin tracery of fog. Moonlight bathed the area, making the sod look rich green in color.
She looked behind them, seeing the massive walls of Fountains jut high above. Somehow, the stranger had led her in a twisting path far away from Shelton... and somewhere amid those ruins were her coachman and a companion, doubtless still searching for her in earnest.
Veronica pressed down a shudder, her arms, seemingly of their own volition, curling even more snugly about her rescuer's neck.
He glanced at her, lifting one brow.
Veronica looked away quickly.
It occurred to her that she felt absurdly safe and protected in this stranger's arms. Though she'd met him barely an hour ago it seemed she'd known him far longer than that. Even the pure, masculine scent of him was becoming familiar.
She chanced a peek at him beneath her lashes. His gaze was straight ahead, because they'd left the grass behind and were approaching yet another piece of stonework. Veronica took the time to study his profile. The fierceness in his features that had at first alarmed her when he'd saved her from the wild dogs seemed now to have been washed away by the moon's glow.
His skin was deeply bronzed by the sun, proof that he was a man who labored out of doors. And his hands, roughened and callused, though tender when he'd touched her, were further proof that this man obviously lived by the sweat of his brow and the strength of his back.
The one odd thing in the picture he presented was his perfect speech and cultured voice. It did not fit the puzzle of who he appeared to be. And in an age when fashionable men kept their faces cleanly shaven, this man sported a close-cropped beard—one, Veronica remembered all too clearly, had felt surprisingly wonderful against her soft skin.
Her quiet appraisal of him came to an end as they reached another stone structure of the abbey. This, too, was roofless and doorl
ess, and it had long since been stripped of its windowpanes. It was more ruinous than some of the places of Fountains she had seen this night, but even so it seemed to be the stranger's destination.
He walked inside the structure, moving immediately to the right, where, Veronica noted, there was a cozy area with a small stone bench.
He set her down on that bench. Beside her, to the very farthest right, was a yawning archway cut into the earth. Cold air, which smelled of dirt and the far-flung moors high above, flowed freely from it, indicating that it snaked beneath the ground to some other opening far away.
"Wh-where are we?" she asked.
"One of the abbey's many outerbuildings," he said. "The grass we just crossed over was probably a garden at one time, long ago. Doubtless it was watered from the River Skell." He indicated to her left.
Veronica turned her head, catching her breath at the sight that greeted her. She'd been so intent on the man that she'd barely noticed anything else—but, oh! what a sight she now beheld.
The opposite wall of the structure had long since fallen away, leaving in full open view the winding River Skell. The river now glistened a perfect silver hue beneath the moon's light, and it was skimmed here and there with feathery wisps of fog.
The arches and foundations of Fountains thrust up and out of her waters like majestic monuments of old, and the Skell, as though to keep hidden some of her ancient secrets, appeared to be a silver ribbon lacing tightly around their bases.
"Oh, my," Veronica whispered. "It—it is beautiful. Stunning."
"Aye," he agreed.
"When I first saw this place, it never occurred to me that it could house anything so—so magical—so lovely as this."
"Aye," he agreed again.
Something in his tone caused Veronica to turn her gaze to him.
She was quite startled to find the man staring at her, transfixed—as though he'd been doing the very same the entire time she'd been talking about the view.
A deep heat suffused Veronica.
If he noticed, he thankfully made no comment.
"If you'll wait here, my lady, I've something for that wound."
"Oh, y-yes... my injury." Veronica glanced down at her habit—anything but look at him!—and spied a deep stain of red on her skirts. "Yes, of course I'll wait, sir. But where—"
She felt a shift of movement and looked up without finishing her sentence.
He was already gone.
Veronica leaned forward on the bench, peering into the Stygian darkness of the earthen passageway he'd obviously just entered.
She frowned, then tamped down a shudder of trepidation. What was he about?
He returned a length of time later, carrying a lit lantern in one fist and a bottle of spirits and what looked to be bandages in the other. The glow of his lamp cast crazed shadows on what was left of the building's walls.
Veronica stiffened, easing back on the stone.
"Do not say you dwell in that cave, sir."
He shook his head.
"It is just a passageway, to another area of Fountains—her cellars and what were once prisons, to be exact."
Veronica relaxed somewhat.
He knelt before her, setting down the lamp, bottle and bandages. His eyes on a direct level with hers, and his face eerily lit from the lantern below, he said plainly, "It isn't the cave where I dwell, my lady, but the prisons. I find them very roomy."
Veronica forced down a gasp. "Surely you jest, sir. No one in their right mind would... what I mean to say is, why would anyone... oh, blast. Tell me, sir, are you a criminal or not?" she demanded.
"I assure you, I am no criminal."
"Are you on the run, then? Perhaps hiding from someone?"
Again, he answered in the negative, though this time not as swiftly or as surely as before.
"Earlier, when my coachman fired his gun, you—you thought that shot was for you, didn't you?" Veronica asked, deciding she might just as well plunge ahead. After all, she and this stranger had shared kisses and touches. What were a few personal questions compared to that? "You even said you'd been 'found out' What did you mean by that, sir?"
"Exactly what I said. One can never be too careful these days, no matter where one dwells."
Veronica blew out a breath of agitation. "I vow, sir, you are being deliberately vague."
He arched one brow at her. "Am I? Forgive me." Even as he spoke, he lifted her left leg.
Veronica winced, not realizing how much her injury had pained her until now—as he forced her to straighten her leg out.
"Are you all right?" he asked.
Veronica nodded. "Yes, yes. I just... I am afraid to have a look at it, sir, for fear, as you said earlier, it—it may need a stitch. Or two." She prayed that wouldn't be the way of it.
"I have a lamp now. I'll be able to see the damage fully." With his left hand cradling her calf, he skimmed up the skirts of her habit with his right hand, pushing the material up past her thigh.
Veronica squeezed her eyes shut tight. "Well?" she murmured, thoroughly drowning in the throes of embarrassment and shame as he viewed her uncovered leg. "Is it terribly bad, sir?"
"Not as terrible as I had at first thought."
"It needs no stitch, then?"
"Not a one, my lady. 'Tis a nasty scrape, but not the gouge I'd feared."
Veronica opened her eyes. "Thank goodness."
"It will need to be cleaned though. And wrapped."
She looked down at him just in time to see him lift the bottle he'd brought. Brandy. A very old bottle, to boot. And what she'd thought to be a bundle of bandages weren't bandages at all, but a clean white shirt. His own, no doubt. And doubtless his only extra one, by the looks of his clothing.
He uncorked the bottle with strong white teeth and spat the cork down to the ground.
"Did—did you unearth that in the cellars of this abbey, sir?"
He shook his head, his lips tilting upward in a slight smile. "Until this night, my lady, I've found very little of worth within Fountains."
What a goose she was being, Veronica knew, but she thought his smile just then was the most handsome of things. And she found herself wondering how his face might look when wreathed in a full smile. On the heels of that came another thought—a puzzle, actually—of what he could have possibly meant by his words just now.
But in the next instant he motioned for her to take the bottle of brandy, and Veronica was brought out of her reverie.
"Though crass this might seem, perhaps a bit of this would fortify you for what is to come, my lady."
Veronica, her usual pragmatic self coming at last to the forefront, said, "Perhaps you are right, sir."
She took the bottle he proffered, put the end of it to her lips, and tipped back a swallow.
The liquor burned all the way to the pit of her stomach, and though her eyes suddenly smarted, Veronica mentally applauded herself for not choking on the stuff.
She handed the bottle back. "Thank you," she said simply.
"Brace yourself, my lady," he advised.
Veronica did just that, curling her gloved fingers about the lip of the stone bench, her body rigid and filled now with a healthy dose of brandy.
Instantly she felt cool liquid splash against her thigh, then cascade in rivulets into her wound and beneath the rent in her stockings.
First came a raw burn, bone deep, one that radiated from her cut all the way through her body to her brain. It seemed that every nerve ending in her thigh was aflame and throbbing with each long, drawn-out beat of her heart.
And then... ah, then, Veronica miraculously felt nothing but the slow, steady caress of the stranger's open palm along the underside of her thigh. Up and down, and back and forth, slowly... gently... methodically. He could not have thought of a more effective way to take her mind off what he was doing.
As he continued the light massage, he poured more of the brandy into the cut. But Veronica felt none of the liquor's sting, only the warmth
of the man's large hand, the touch of his fingers higher... higher... and then, swirling down once again, painting a path with his fingertips to the area just beneath her knee.
Veronica let out a breath, tipping her head back against the ruinous wall behind her, embarrassed at her predicament and yet not so embarrassed that she wanted him to stop his caresses. All she could see above her was the moon and the stars and the black sweep of night.
"Are you all right?" he inquired.
"Yes," she said. No, she thought.
"The wound is not bleeding as much now. Very little, in fact."
"That is good news, sir." Did he not realize how he'd stirred her senses with his bold touch?
"I'll bind it as tightly as I dare. You'll have a physician tend to this on the morrow, yes?"
"Yes. Of course." But what about the rest of her? Veronica wondered. Could a doctor tend to all that this man had unleashed within her?
She heard the rent and tear of fabric, and then the feel of his hand was about her thigh once again as he gently dabbed at and around the scrape, pouring more of the brandy atop it. That done, he steadied her booted heel atop his own thigh as he used both hands to bind the wound with fresh strips of cloth.
Veronica, all the while, watched the play of starlight above, not really seeing the twinkling lights but seeing instead the remembered sight of the man's eyes and his half smile of a moment ago.
"Do you know," she whispered, head still tilted back, "I-I don't even know your name."
"You never asked."
She glanced down at him. "Will you share it with me?"
There was a long pause, and then: "Aye. I will." He tied a knot in a strip of the fabric about her thigh. "'Tis Julian, my lady," he said, his gaze on hers, watching, perhaps waiting to see what her reaction would be.
Julian. A name as refined as his voice, yet as unsuited to the look of him and the fact he dwelled in some ruinous prisons, obviously poverty-stricken.
"Just—just Julian? No last name, sir?"
"Just Julian."
Veronica let forth a small breath of sound, the brandy in her belly and in her wound both warming and relaxing her, possibly even making her feel bold. "I hadn't expected you to actually share your full name with me, sir. Obviously you—"
A Dangerous Courtship (To Woo an Heiress, Book 3) Page 3