Briar Rose

by Kimberly Cates

  Rhiannon Fitzgerald's probing was disturbing enough on its own. But equally surprising and unnerving was the knot that had tightened in his gut the moment she mentioned the names of the men who had sought him.

  Sir Thorne Carville. There was little to astonish Redmayne there. He'd known from the first he would have to deal with the man again someday. As for the Irishman, it was all too easy to recall how he'd earned the man's enmity. During his first months in Ireland, Redmayne had planned to break the Irish people's ties to their past by destroying the monuments that were a constant reminder of glory long faded. Standing stones and passage tombs, mystic rings of stones and ruins of enchanted castles. The first victim to fall at his orders had been a passage tomb near O'Leary's cottage.

  But neither Carville nor O'Leary had disturbed him. He'd had plenty of enemies before and had never allowed that fact to trouble him. It was the presence of the third man that gave him an unexpected twinge.

  Barton.

  "Were those men your friends?" He recalled the echo of Rhiannon's question and his own hard laugh of dismissal.

  "Give me credit for better taste, madam," he'd scoffed. "If lever stooped to make a friend..." They'd been nothing but careless words. He knew he never would call anyone by that name. But Kenneth Barton had been too thick-headed to realize it.

  Redmayne grimaced. He'd all but drowned in the youth's hero worship when Barton first became his aide-de-camp. An awkward, fumbling, beardless boy who had an irritating habit of dropping things the instant Redmayne entered the room. It wasn't an unfamiliar reaction—Redmayne had always disconcerted those around him. What had unnerved Redmayne far more was the day Barton had stopped dropping things. The day Mary Fallon Delaney and her husband had ridden away from the garrison, and Redmayne had let them go.

  It had been futile to pursue the matter any further, Redmayne had claimed. He'd believed that was his reason for releasing them. Barton had not believed it for a moment. And once the whole affair was over, no matter what efforts Redmayne made to push the man back to a comfortable distance, he couldn't escape the knowledge that Barton might yet be awed by him, but that maybe, just maybe, the incomprehensible man also liked him.

  Even the promotion Redmayne had arranged hadn't sobered the man one bit. Hopeful as a puppy, Barton had always hung about. And Redmayne had had to shove him aside more than once, since dealing him a sharp rap on the nose lacked the dignity required in the army.

  From the instant Redmayne had scanned the note alerting him to a traitor in his own garrison, he had thought it was immaterial who had betrayed him. Why did the mere possibility Barton might be involved affect him so strangely?

  Doubtless that was Rhiannon Fitzgerald's fault, too. All those sorrowful glances she'd given him beneath those absurdly long eyelashes. The soft ache in her voice, as if she grieved for his loneliness.

  The woman should look to her own situation! She talked to animals, for God's sake! She rattled about the countryside in this garish little nutshell of a wagon, totally defenseless. As unfit to be wandering about as a babe who'd toddled off into the forest. She'd lost her home, her father, and the servants who'd doubtless looked after her every need, but she considered herself fortunate, rich. Why? Because she dared to love everything and everyone with the same abandon, from a recalcitrant falcon to a shimmer of mist atop a hill? Because she chose to see what was good—even in a wounded officer who had deadened his heart long ago?

  Blast, had she meddled in his mind so much these past few days that he'd begun to sort through his acquaintances, searching for someone who might give a damn if he died?

  If he had been such a fool, even in his subconscious, then the arrival of Barton had been well timed indeed. An appropriate reminder of why he'd always held himself aloof from his fellow creatures, completely unattached to anyone or anything.

  She'd thought he was in pain because he'd been betrayed. But he knew the truth: no one could betray you unless you were foolhardy enough to care about them in the first place. Despite his small stumbles over Mary Fallon Delaney and Kenneth Barton, he was no fool, and not even the softest green eyes in Ireland were going to make him one.

  "Captain Redmayne?"

  He started at the sound of her voice at his shoulder. He turned to see her standing there with fresh if somewhat threadbare towels draped over her arm and a pot of soft soap in her hand. "Is there anything I can do for you before I go down to the stream? I'll only be gone a little while."

  Her cheeks were tinged with pink, her gaze flickering away from his. She was going to bathe, Redmayne realized with a swift surge of satisfaction. What more auspicious opportunity could there be to begin his siege? He would wait a little while, long enough for her to begin, and then...

  "Captain Redmayne?"

  He glanced up at her, hastily concealing any hint of the machinations going on inside his head. But she gazed at him with eyes so guileless, so soft with concern, that he felt as if someone had layered a fine coat of silt over his body.

  "I hate to leave you alone." She hesitated.

  "Go ahead. I'm used to it." Damnation if that didn't sound a trifle weary, almost wistful. The words, not his tone. He grimaced and said what he'd meant all along: "I prefer it that way."

  "I know," she replied, but something about her voice infuriated him. It was not as if she agreed with him but rather as if she knew some truth he wasn't ready to admit to.

  He was still attempting to think up an appropriate reply when she started down the grassy bank to where a copse of trees sheltered a bend of the stream from view.

  Graceful and light as petals caught on the wind, she glided along, her skirts swaying like the cup of a bluebell, rivers of golden sunlight streaming through the dark flow of her hair. She had none of the elegance of the worldly beauties who had graced Redmayne's bed, none of that practiced perfection, and yet there were men who would think her even lovelier.

  In place of satin she trailed an astonishing warmth, a vibrancy in her wake, as if even the sunlight couldn't resist that intangible aura she spun. Instead of jewels gracing her throat and wrists and the tender lobes of her ears, stars sparkled in her eyes. And her hands were scented not with attar of roses but rather with cinnamon and vanilla and something far more rare: genuine compassion.

  His hand knotted into a fist. Blast! One would think he'd taken that bullet in his head! He'd never been a man to spin out such absurdities over any woman.

  Why, then, did he feel this strange fascination? This need to follow her with his gaze, this anticipation, waiting to see what she would say next? It was merely that she was a curiosity, he assured himself. A woman unlike any he had ever known.

  Even Fallon had been all fire and defiance and tempestuous emotions. She was a woman who would keep a man racing in circles just to keep up with her. Rhiannon had the same measure of courage, but there was something else in her—a gentleness, despite her humor, an indefinable quality that invited a man to rest.

  He surprised a laugh out of himself, his injured shoulder aching. Rest? The woman hadn't given him a moment's peace since she hauled him into her caravan!

  Swearing under his breath, he surveyed the path she'd taken, realizing that sometime during his nonsensical reverie the woman had disappeared from view.

  Just as well, he supposed. He'd given her enough time to settle into her ablutions. Half undressed, wet and unwary, she should be vulnerable enough to his attentions. A strange brew of self-disgust and expectation stirred in his belly. Only because he would be meeting her challenge, of course.

  In his head he imagined her bare feet padding across the thick carpet of turf, the grass growing damp beside the sparkling water. He imagined how long it would take for her deft fingers to unfasten the army of buttons that marched between the soft hills of her breasts. Doubtless she would pause to study the face of any pretty wildflower that happened to perch on the stream bank. And God help him if some disobliging trout showed her an injured fin. Better to get down there befor
e the woman unwittingly outflanked him again!

  Redmayne straightened, limping in the direction she'd gone, wondering if he'd ever looked forward to crossing swords quite this much.

  Even wounded, he was able to move with the stealth of a predator, a skill learned in his grandfather's household, then perfected on scouting missions before battle. He intended to steal up as quietly as possible, give himself time to gauge the best angle from which to "attack." But as the underbrush fell away before him, dappled shadows giving way to the sunshine spilling over the stream, he stopped, all thoughts scattering at the scene before him.

  Rhiannon had flung herself into her bath with the same joy with which she faced everything else in her day, wholeheartedly, delightedly, abandoning any lingering fears on the mossy bank along with her heavy skirts. Clad in only her shift, she splashed in the water, hurling cascades of sparkling silver drops at the foxhound gamboling about in a futile effort to find her. Her freshly washed hair clung about her shoulders, and down her back, the thin fabric of her undergarments molding her curves like the hands of a lover.

  Rosy patches of her skin glowed through, the dusky circles of her nipples pushing at the fabric, accenting lush breasts. A trim waist and full hips were clearly visible, and a man would have had to be a corpse not to feel a stirring in his loins at the dark shadow of curls arrowing down toward slender legs that seemed to go on forever.

  Perhaps he'd managed to deaden his emotions, Redmayne thought, but he still had an appreciation for perfection. Beauty. Yet Rhiannon Fitzgerald's own brand of beauty was fashioned out of a dozen imperfections, flaws that should have made her unappealing, yet instead held his gaze prisoner, made him wonder exactly what it was that compelled him to keep looking at her.

  Simple lust, Redmayne reasoned with grim humor. The fact that he hadn't troubled himself to take a woman to his bed since he'd arrived in Ireland. Even the icily controlled Lionel Redmayne's body needed release upon occasion, if only to keep himself from being distracted. Perhaps searing the lady with hot stares wouldn't take much effort after all. And yet... the sooner she surrendered, the better. Like all good strategies, there was danger in this one.

  He was a man with a man's needs.

  And it had been a very long time.

  CHAPTER 7

  She sensed his presence mere heartbeats before she saw him, a solitary figure, golden hair sunstruck. Blades of shadow and light hewed his face with the patrician arrogance of the first fairy king who had set forth his royal foot upon the ageless hills of Ireland. Bold, almost too beautiful for human eyes to see.

  But a kind of defiance shaped the set of his jaw, an unfamiliar buzz of tension emanating from his lean body in waves that flowed around her, tightening about Rhiannon's breast.

  She stilled, tried to suck in a deep breath, chill water running in rivulets down her body. She might have been a stray beggar maid confronting the god of water, her wet hair clinging in a silken web to cheeks already burning with embarrassment, surprise, and something foreign, perhaps a little frightening.

  Shoving away the ridiculous sensation, she started toward Redmayne, afraid that something was amiss. The men were returning, his wounds were paining him, while she stood there like a witling gawking at him. "What is it?" she asked, sloshing toward Redmayne. "Is something wrong?"

  But at that instant, a miracle occurred. Milton realized one of his most cherished aspirations: he actually located what he was searching for. The foxhound launched himself from a patch of mud, his massive paws slamming into Rhiannon's stomach. Her breath went out in a whoosh, the impact hurtling her backward. She crashed down, her mouth filling with a wave of choking water. Her backside slammed into the rock-strewn bottom of the stream, bruising her flesh almost as much as it wounded what little dignity she still possessed.

  Sputtering, flailing, she fought to regain her feet, but the tangle of sodden shift and elated canine made it impossible. Milton might actually have succeeded in drowning her, and she might not have objected overmuch, except that a hard hand manacled her wrist, dragging her upright, a deep voice biting out a low command. "Down."

  With her free hand, Rhiannon scrubbed her seaweedlike hair out of her face just in time to see Milton perch obediently on the stream bank, his cloudy eyes fixed with infuriating devotion in the general direction of the man who had dared to discipline him.

  Redmayne stood so close to Rhiannon that the heat radiating from his body penetrated her own chilled skin. His low chuckle astonished her, banished her fear that some calamity had overtaken them, yet tightened the net of embarrassment he'd trapped her in.

  "Saved from an untimely death. And a most undignified one at that," Redmayne said. "It seems we are even now, Rhiannon."

  Her name. He'd merely called her by her name for the first time. But it had changed everything. A strange shiver coursed down her spine, not from the cool of the breeze against her wet skin but rather from the husky rumble of his voice, the hot brush of his breath against her cheek. She tried to swallow, but her throat was inexplicably dry.

  "Captain, wh-what... what are you doing here?"

  "A fine way to thank your rescuer, that. Perhaps you need lessons in the etiquette of a damsel in distress. This is your cue to fall upon me in abject gratitude." He smiled. Her heart stopped. God above, she hadn't even realized the man could smile. No one should be given such a lethal weapon to wield against a woman.

  "I just... I didn't expect—"

  "Any company? That is obvious enough, considering your attire."

  She skittered back a step, glancing down, agonizingly aware of the thinness of her soaked shift—transparent as morning mist, the curves and shadows of her most secret places visible to Redmayne's all-too-keen gaze.

  Any modest, self-respecting woman would have chosen that moment to dive headlong into the water—if it had been deep enough to cover her properly. But Rhiannon was stunned to find herself standing as still as a woodland doe, surprised, curious, trembling just a little at the unexpected sensations rippling through her.

  She raised her own gaze to Redmayne's face. Could there be such a thing as hot ice? The piercing blue of his eyes burned. Innocent as she might be, she recognized that heat for what it was, yet she could scarce believe her own deduction. Desire. Was it real? Or as ephemeral as the visions of fairy folk she'd imagined were dancing within the stone circles when she was a child?

  She wasn't certain. She only knew that no man had ever looked at her that way before. She scrambled to find her scattered senses.

  "Was there something you wanted?" You.

  He communicated it without words, a thick pulse that entered her veins where his fingers were still circled about her wrist. He raised his gaze to hers, and she felt her breath catch as if she'd heard him voice his need aloud.

  He cleared his throat, withdrawing his hand. She felt the loss of his touch as if he'd left a wound, and she realized in that instant how much she'd missed being touched.

  Oh, Triona and her husband always greeted her with an embrace and a buss on the cheek. Other friends as well were quick to squeeze her hand. But she was on the road so much of the time that she was like someone thirsty, receiving only sips of water when she needed so much to drink deep.

  "You asked why I came down here," Redmayne said. "I had hoped that perhaps you would do me one more favor. One of my greatest flaws is that I am somewhat fastidious. I'm afraid my convalescence has left me feeling rather gritty, and a sponge bath is less than satisfactory."

  Of course, that was why he had followed her. She should have anticipated that a man like Redmayne wouldn't be satisfied overlong with her halfhearted dabbings with the sponge. "I should have realized that and offered to bring you down here, instead of indulging myself. I just didn't think."

  "It's no sin, Rhiannon, failing to anticipate someone else's every need. I'm actually rather glad you can't read my mind." He was mocking her, and himself. Yet she had sensed his thoughts a moment ago, and she'd been flustered and
delighted and frightened by what she'd found there.

  Even more surprising was the captain's other comment: "It's no sin, Rhiannon."

  Was he merely teasing? Or had he actually realized the truth? This man of ice, of logic and reason, who claimed to care for no one—was he the first person ever to unearth her most secret vulnerability, the thing that troubled her more than any other failing? That crushing sense of responsibility that had been a part of her for as long as the green of her eyes and the dimple in her cheek.

  "Rhiannon?"

  The low rumble of her name upon his lips startled her. And she looked up at him, heat stealing into her face.

  "If you've got your balance, I'll let you return to your own bath. There is plenty of time later for me to make myself less objectionable."

  He intended to leave. It was alarming to realize how fiercely she wanted him to stay.

  "Captain, please. I wouldn't want you making such a long walk again on your injured leg. Besides, I'm finished with everything except getting myself dry."

  He arched one eyebrow. "You're certain?"

  "Of course!"

  "Rhiannon, you're not to be trusted. You would say you were finished if you'd barely dipped your toes in the water if you thought someone else needed you."

  She should have felt exposed—had it been possible to feel more exposed than she actually was, garbed in her shift. Instead she was glad. "You have your choice, sir." She scooped up the hem of her shift, then crossed to where she'd laid her gown. "Either I can help you with your bath, keeping your wounds at least somewhat dry in the process, or I can leave you to the tender ministrations of Milton."

  The dog thumped his tail as if to show that he was more than willing to be of service.

  "I much prefer you to your hound," Redmayne said as she grasped her gown. "But—pardon me if I'm being rude—but your dress, there is no reason to put it on and get it all soaked on my account. I'll keep my eyes averted if you wish."