Touch the Wind: Touch the Wind Book 1
Page 26
O’Malley shook his head. “I’ve told you, Father, I’ve nothing more to confess.” O’Malley’s voice was as rough as his looks. “Though I’m certain yon bully boy could blister your ears. Him and that other one—Herbert. Their laying on of hands is a wee bit different from yours, good Father. At least the day guard’s kind enough to leave bruises where they don’t show.”
The old priest clucked and began the same sermon he’d preached to O’Malley since his incarceration, judging from O’Malley’s wince. Christiana stepped behind the priest and leaned to the side. Lowering the betty lamp to light her face, she watched O’Malley’s eyes grow wide, then quickly fill with fear for her.
Simon had insisted the rescue be kept secret, lest someone overhear their plans.
Or force it out of him, Christiana thought grimly, ignoring the warning look that O’Malley leveled at her.
The room held naught but a pile of musty straw, a single moth-eaten blanket, and a slop bucket. She found a niche on the mildewed wall and slid the lamp into it. While her back was yet turned, she pulled out the belaying pin and tested its weight, wondering how hard she’d have to hit Simon to do him the same kind of damage he’d inflicted on her father.
Christiana hid the pin in the folds of fabric and worked her way to the door, her heart thudding in double time against her chest, her palm sweaty against the warm wooden shaft. She stepped closer, closer, eyes focused on the bald spot that Simon’s creative combing of his thin brown hair failed to cover. She aimed for it, and Simon crumpled on the floor.
“What?!” The priest’s words were cut short by the chains O’Malley wrapped around his throat.
“I’m sorry, Father,” Christiana whispered, bending over Simon, who moaned, then stilled. “But O’Malley’s right. He has nothing to confess. ‘Tis the British who are at fault. Impressment. Wrongful arrest. Holding him without a trial. There is no justice when a man wears chains for another’s crimes.”
The priest would have protested, but O’Malley tightened his hold and growled in the priest’s ear. “The person in this room most in need of confession lies at your feet, good Father. If you truly wish to make a difference in these prisoners’ lives, see to their physical health as well as the spiritual. Report what you observe. British law, poor tho’ it is, forbids torture of prisoners, and I cannot think but much of what we suffer is just that. See that the guards do their duty and no more, and others will thank you for it.”
That said, O’Malley whispered, “Now you’ll have my confession, Father. Forgive me…for assaulting a priest….”
Christiana watched as O’Malley pressed his fingers against the priest’s skull at points behind both ears until he had rendered him unconscious. O’Malley lowered him to the floor, taking care not to hurt him any more than necessary. Christiana found the keys, dropped on the straw when Simon fell, and frantically searched for the one that fit the manacles. Once O’Malley had shed his chains, they secured the guard and priest, binding wrists and hands and gagging them with ragged strips of cloth torn from Simon’s shirt.
Securing the last knot on the priest’s ankles, O’Malley glanced across and nodded at her padded chest. “That had best be clothes for me, girl, or you have some explaining to do.”
Christiana felt warmth flood her cheeks. Grateful for the feeble light, she finished tying Simon’s feet, then rose to her own. Turning away, she reached into her bodice and pulled out another coarse brown robe.
“Here.” She handed it to her father. “Put this on—and pray, be quick. I’ll not feel safe until we’re back aboard ship and far from here.”
O’Malley donned the priestly garb over his tattered clothes. When Christiana failed to produce aught else, he shook his head and sighed. “Ah, well. Forgive me again, Father,” he whispered, taking his belt, rosary, and sandals.
More properly dressed, O’Malley tucked the belaying pin through the rope at his waist and hid it in the folds of fabric. Cinching his belt tight enough to hold it and pulling up his cowl, he motioned towards the door. Christiana nodded, aware that time was of the essence. They needed to be away from these stone walls.
Leaving the two men bound and gagged, they locked the cell behind them. The keys disappeared in the folds of O’Malley’s sleeves. He walked like a pious old man, not someone who believed that priestly robes were likely as close to heaven as he’d get.
They had passed a number of occupied cells when O’Malley stopped, abruptly. “A moment,” he whispered.
Christiana watched, horrified when he eyed the next cell door and pulled out the keys. “Are ye daft?” she hissed in his ear.
“Nay,” he said, his voice grim. “But I’ll not leave without giving these poor creatures a chance, at least.”
Mimicking the priest’s shuffle, O’Malley approached the cell and whistled softly through the bars. Almost immediately a face appeared, marred by bruises and etched with lines of pain and surprise. “Ten minutes,” she heard her father say in Gaelic, and a dark head nodded.
Only when they were safely past the outer guards and well on their way did Ian O’Malley speak again.
“I thank you, lass,” he murmured as they walked abreast, looking for all the world like an elderly priest with his own ministering angel. “But why the hell did you risk it? I sent word to Mick, told him to let you know, but only when it was over—”
His question nearly halted his daughter in her tracks. “Mick got no word,” she told him, moving again, picking up her pace, determined to be away before the alarm was raised.
Ian barely managed to keep up, as weak as he was from the starving and the beatings. His broken ribs weren’t helping his focus as he tried to sort things out. “But Druscilla came to see me,” he managed between tortured breaths. “After my arrest. Before they moved me. She said she’d taken care of it.”
“She did,” Christiana told him, her voice grim. “But not as you wished. She sent for me, instead. And she gave me a ring,” she added. “Emeralds set in gold. She said it was from you.”
“Nay.” Ian clenched his fists, tormented by flitting shadows of memory and cursing his ability to make them coalesce. He gritted his teeth, struggling to remember what he’d been trying to for weeks. The mention in one breath of Druscilla and an unknown ring triggered a slow melting, lifting some of the haze that had plagued him since the night before his arrest.
Drugged, thought Ian. He’d been drugged. But who doctored his drink? He’d tested every theory and kept coming back to one. And to learn Druscilla hadn’t contacted Mick but Christiana….
Which still left the burning question of why.
Drugged, he couldn’t remember details of the game. Whom he’d played. Who had wagered the ring that led to his arrest. But his mind was clear now, clear enough to realize that Druscilla had betrayed him, and to recognize the figure who stepped from the shadows, with a pair of pistols leveled at them.
Bryce Vallé.
Vengeance burned in Ian’s veins, making the scars and welts on his back and buttocks swell, his bruised skin and cracked ribs twitch beneath his tattered clothes and the coarse wool robe. “You’ve come a long way, Judas, if you think I’ll ever play cards again with the likes of you, after the last hand you dealt.”
Christiana felt as if she were poised on a precipice and the cliff was crumbling beneath her feet. Bryce was armed. Even if he somehow missed them both, the report of gunfire would bring the law running and there would be no escape, for either of them.
Bryce canted his head. “I’m surprised you remember, Delacorte. Druscilla used enough powder to fell a lesser man.” The smile that shaped his lips failed to reach his eyes. “You were nearly unable to sit a chair by the time I let you win the round…and the ring….”
A thousand thoughts crowded Christiana’s mind. One loomed largest—how had Bryce gained possession of the rings, the one he’d lost to O’Malley and the emerald band he’d given to Druscilla, used as bait for his brother, with O’Malley as the lure?
Still, there was just Bryce and his pistols against the two of them. She prepared herself, ready to throw herself at his feet and create a distraction, but any hope for escape was crushed beneath the heels of a dozen sailors who stepped from the shadows, weapons drawn and ready for action.
“But enough,” Bryce said, shifting his gaze to rake her boldly. “You’ve been a bad girl, ma petite,” he chastised, each word filled with the promise of punishment. “Almost as bad as our mutual acquaintance who let greed get the better of him. If Simon still hopes to collect the reward on my brother when he comes, well…I fear the law does not look kindly on those who help emancipate a felon, even one not yet convicted. And he will be, I assure you.”
Bryce’s lips twisted in a demon’s smile, while the devil glowed hot in his eyes. “The false priest and his harlot daughter.”
Bryce thought of Laurent, blocking the alternate avenue of escape with another twelve of the Sea Siren’s men. Laurent, who wanted to destroy Jean Delacorte—Ian O’Malley—as much as Bryce wanted to destroy Justin. But Laurent was far enough away, he could afford to show lenience to O’Malley’s spawn. “Ma petite, I’m afraid your actions have made absolution impossible, but—”
Bryce paused as if weighing his options, though she could be certain the scales of justice played no part in it. “Perhaps I can sway the court to mercy,” he told her. “In fact,” he said, “I shall personally escort you from here to the governor’s mansion and plead your case myself. If you appear contrite and can humble yourself long enough to beg his pardon, I may yet convince him to lighten your punishment, commute a certain prison sentence to indenture. Say, seven years of servitude—”
“To you?” Christiana asked tightly, already knowing his answer. Bryce was nothing if not thorough. He’d sacrificed her father in a scheme to rid himself of his brother and stood on the verge of gaining his family’s fortune and a personal servant. From the gleam in his eye, she knew what he’d expect of her, too.
She found the scratches she’d put on his cheek and clenched her hands into fists, helpless to do anything more than look at him with fear and loathing. Bryce nodded, smiling darkly. Witnessing their exchange, O’Malley tensed, coiled tight as a spring, a low growl burning in his throat. At the first hint of forward motion, Christiana caught his arm. “Don’t,” she told him, praying he would not rise to Bryce’s bait.
Bryce laughed, an ugly sound that grated on her taut nerves. “Would you rather have her jailed,” he taunted O’Malley, “knowing what she’ll face?” He looked past them, in the direction of the prison, before settling his overbright gaze on her. “If you can’t imagine life under men like Lewis Simon, ask your father what he’s been through. Let him tell you what you can expect. More so, being female, possessing a woman’s tender flesh.”
The soldiers snickered at Bryce’s inference. She saw that O’Malley’s face, pale from his imprisonment, was even whiter when he raked back the cowl. “I understand your grudge against me, for all I’ve won from you, but she’s done nothing to deserve such a fate!” he cried. “Jesus and Mary, ‘twould be kinder to kill us now,” he told him, deadly serious, preferring a pistol ball or sword thrust to the living hell he’d suffered these past weeks.
Bryce stroked his cheek, as if giving it serious thought. O’Malley settled a hand upon her shoulder and exhaled softly. He was resigned to death. Realizing it, Christiana blanched, ready to bargain with the devil for their lives.
She twisted free. Pressing one hand to her roiling stomach and raising the other in supplication, she forced the words past the tightness in her throat. “If I go with you, willingly, will you let O’Malley go free?”
Bryce shook his head. “I can’t.”
“Can’t, or won’t? He’s an innocent man! You know he is!”
Bryce didn’t bother to deny it. “I’m sorry, ma petite. His denouement has already been written by another. The governor tells me he must hang.”
Christiana wanted to scream, to rail at the fates. All of her frustration, she directed at Bryce. “And you expect me to serve you? You—who would place the noose around my father’s neck?”
Bryce’s smile fractured, signaling that his patience was nearly at an end.
“And why not?” Bryce clipped, thinking of all he’d done to bring them to this point. “I’ve earned it! I deserve it! I’m the one who hunted down our parents’ murderers!” he told her, wanting this woman—who had measured him against his brother and found him lacking—to know the truth, to see how wrong she’d been. “I’m the one who saw that they paid for their crimes. I avenged our parents’ deaths, and avenged Felicia’s death as well!”
The icy satisfaction in Bryce’s eyes left no doubt that anyone guilty of murder on that raid had already danced with death. But that was three years ago. When had he had his revenge? How many months, or years, had Vallé lived in torment, blaming himself, seeking those responsible?
“And you let Vallé go on searching?” she spat, comprehending the depth of Bryce’s hatred. “You allowed him to keep looking, needlessly, believing they were out there, somewhere, waiting to be found. For the love of God, why?”
Why? The question slashed open anew the wound that never fully healed, that ate at his soul no matter how hard he tried to drown it in alcohol and female flesh. He damned Justin. Damned Felicia. Damned his pride that would not let him beg her to stay. He had asked, and she’d chosen his brother. His brother, who’d already accumulated more wealth than he knew what to do with.
After hearing Felicia’s final answer, Bryce had sought solace in a bottle then, too, shared with a man he considered his friend as well as his business partner. Ironic, that his bastard half-brother Matthieu hated their father just as much. He had jumped at the chance to turn privateer and raid their father’s ships. While deep in his cups, Bryce had bitterly denounced Felicia and the dowry she would be bringing to Justin, carried with her aboard the Gabrielle, more riches for their brother’s coffers.
One month later, a bag had been placed in his hand, filled with his Judas silver from Matthieu’s most recent venture. As was his custom, Bryce had waited until he was alone, secure in the privacy of his apartment, to count the cost…only this time his exhilaration turned to horror when he saw his mother’s ring and understood what had been done. Matthieu eventually confessed how he had raided the Gabrielle, intending to rob Justin of his bride’s dowry. He hadn’t known their father was aboard. With Matthieu recognized, with this and all future enterprises compromised, he’d been forced to kill everyone and make it look as if done by pirates.
Bryce had not authorized the attack on the Gabrielle, but he’d as much as sent his mother to her death—and God knew, of them all, she alone was pure in heart, undeserving of the fate she’d met. He had silently vowed, then and there, to see that Matthieu and his crew met the same violent death she had suffered.
With Laurent’s help, Bryce succeeded, but he took no comfort in the screams of the dying that echoed in the corners of his mind. He was damned to years of torment, living with Felicia’s ultimate betrayal, mourning his mother’s senseless death, regretting Matthieu’s loss. He had railed at the heavens and cursed the fates, but he was always, always aware that if it weren’t for his brother’s marriage, their mother would never have been aboard the Gabrielle. Ultimately, he’d decided that only one person’s blood could wash the stain from his hands, the blood of the other one who shared responsibility: Felicia’s husband. His brother Justin, whom he vowed would suffer too, before finally putting him out of his misery, ridding himself of his brother and his guilt once and for all.
Christiana stared at Bryce, saw the flicker of regret chase across his face. His eyes darkened with despair, and she felt the first glimmer of hope,
that she could appeal to him on some level, could sway him to show mercy. But the expression proved ephemeral, disappearing in a white hot rage that hardened his jaw and simmered in the depths of his eyes. He wrapped his steely grip around each pistol, as if they were throats, and squeezed malevolently.
“Why?” he asked. “Why? Because he deserves to suffer!” Bryce shouted. Nostrils flaring, he pinned Christiana with his gaze, and a dark shiver crawled over her skin when it raked her boldly.
“Enough,” he murmured, his voice deceptively soft, as if he might just forgive her for choosing his brother. But Christiana knew differently. Bryce would never forget, and the unholy light in his eye was filled with the awful, silent promise that she’d pay and pay dearly for her earlier rejection. “The hour grows late, ma petite, and these men are sworn to see your father to his bed, while we go to find ours.”
Christiana felt her stomach clench, cold and heavy, a leaden fist that twisted her heart in keenest desperation. “Oh, please,” she whimpered, unashamed of begging when their very lives were at stake. “Please, don’t take him!”
Bryce motioned the two men front and center forward. Christiana stepped in front of O’Malley and rooted herself, feet planted apart, until O’Malley’s hands clamped on her shoulders, and he spun her around to face him.
“Nay, lass,” he gritted, locking his gaze with hers, his face blurred through her tears. “You’ve done all you could for me. ‘Tis time to look for yourself. Just know, when I go,” he said, “that I go to my grave loving you.”
“Oh, Father!” she whispered, unable to stem the tide of tears any longer. “Oh, da, I love ye, too!”
O’Malley welcomed her when she stepped closer, wincing when she hugged him to her heart, though he kept one arm clamped tight about his healing ribs. He lifted an awkward hand to her cowl, clucked when he found the shortened length of her hair, and crooned softly in his lilting native tongue. “Hush, hush,” he whispered against her ear. “I’ve drunk the cup, and I’m willing to pay for it, darling girl. But remember, lass, God doesn’t close one door without opening another. If you get the chance, run far and fast away from here. It will make no difference in the end I meet, and I’d see you safe, at least.”