Black Falcon's Lady (Celtic Rogues Book 1) (32 page)

"Don't listen to him," Tade flared, his gaze sweeping the other implacable faces. “Maybe he has helped us plan before, but he's never been bloodied. You all know me. You've seen me fight. We can strike just before dawn. I can lead you to—"

"To a cursed massacre?" Gilvarry Beagan bit out. "Blast it, Tade, our man inside the jail claims there are three hundred soldiers within Rookescommon's walls. That they stand poised there to snare the Black Falcon. Somehow the Sassenachs have learned of the link between you and Dev."

"Aye, the link between me and Dev," Tade raged. "He's my brother, damn it, and the bloody bastards are going to rip his body to pieces, for Christ's sake!"

Tade saw Reeve rake a hand back through his wild hair, his mouth twisting as if he felt sickened by what he had heard. "Tade, we love Devin, too, and we know what will befall him. The best we can do is to plant one man amid the crowd and have him bury a bullet in Dev's chest before the hoodsman starts working his horrors. I'll fire the shot myself, and I promise you I'll make it clean and quick."

"He's not going to die!" Tade bellowed. "Damn it, I'll not let him die!"

"Tade, the devil himself couldn't tear Devin out of the midst of three hundred soldiers and get him out of Rookescommon." Beagan reached out and gripped Tade's arm, but Tade yanked free.

"I'll sell my cursed soul if I have to, but I'm wresting Dev from that blasted prison alive.”

The knock on the door stilled the words in Tade's throat, making him suddenly horribly aware of how loud they had been shouting, how careless they had grown as the rage bolted through them. He glimpsed the other men reaching for the butts of hidden pistols and the hilts of knives as they glanced toward the shuttered window that would prove their one escape route if they had been betrayed to the soldiers.

The knock sounded again, but it was soft and tentative, not the crashing of fist upon wood that would precede a rush of battle-ready Sassenachs. "Leave us be, whoever you are," Tade barked. "We've no time for—"

"Tade?" the voice was muffled, but he recognized it immediately.

With a blistering oath he yanked the bar from the locked door and flung it wide. "Deirdre, what are you doing here?” The words froze on his tongue as he caught a glimpse of rich sable hair and changeable blue-gold eyes beyond Deirdre's shoulder. “Bloody hell!” he hissed, but the sight of Maryssa's face—so pale, so full of his own horrible torment—struck through him like a Saracen blade. The crumpled map fell from his numb fingers, and it was all he could do not to yank the trembling Maryssa into his arms and bury his hopelessness and desperation in her sweet warmth.

"Maura." He croaked her name, scarce believing his own eyes, thinking that the madness that had been threatening to overcome him since the morning in Christ's Wound had gotten him at last in its grip.

He heard Reeve mutter a prayer of thanks, heard his men fall silent, and felt suspicion all around him as they regarded the English heiress.

Then Reeve pushed past him, drawing both Maryssa and Deirdre through the open door. "Thank God you've come. Maryssa, you've got to talk to him."

Fury surged anew into Tade's limbs, mingled with a sudden wariness, as his memory of the last time he had seen Maryssa rose within him. But he turned his anger on Reeve, scowling. "Curse it, Reeve, don't drag Maura into this."

"She's obviously been dragged into this blasted mess already, Tade! I doubt Bainbridge Wylder escorted her here in his carriage."

"Reeve, nay. Please," Maryssa begged, her gaze flashing uncertainly from Reeve's freckled countenance to Tade's furious one. "I came—came because I overheard my father and Sir Ascot Dallywoulde plotting at Nightwylde. I thought to warn Tade . . . all of you.”

"Warn us?" Gilvarry Beagan scoffed. "An English Wylder?”

"Gil—" Deirdre's quavery objection was cut off by Tade's command.

"Hold your tongue, Beagan." Tade's voice was low and dangerous as he battled the hurt that tore at him from Maryssa's vulnerable eyes.

He heard her suck in a deep breath as her hand drifted, feather-light, to the taut muscles beneath his sleeve and she turned her pleading gaze to his own hard emerald one. "If I could just—just have a moment alone with you to—to tell you something."

The feel of her small fingers on his arm seemed to sear through Tade. His eyes swept away from hers, the pallor and fear in her delicate face piercing him. "Get out," he ordered the men about him. "Drag Neylan up and douse him in a water barrel to rouse him from his stupor. Then go and make your pistols and sabers ready. We'll ride in an hour's time."

He saw Deirdre's stricken face, her thin shoulders cradled in Reeve's capable arm. Almost as an afterthought, Tade reached out, attempting to lighten the fear he sensed in his sister by cuffing her gently on the chin. "Don't fear, Dee," he said with a mockery of his usual smile. "Once all this is past, Devin and I'll take turns whacking your backside with a willow switch for haring off to Derry in the dead of night, and you'll wish us both in the dungeons of Rookescommon."

He could see Deirdre struggle to bring a smile to her lips, but the trembling of that still childish mouth made the effort all the more pathetic and painful as Reeve led her and the others from the room.

Tade turned and paced across the small chamber to where the shutters stood closed against the night. Cold blue stars pierced the blackness visible through the cracks in the battered wood. Tade leaned on the ledge and shoved one shutter wide. The room, filled with the scent and sweetness of Maryssa, threatened to crush his chest.

He heard the door close softly behind the last of the men, heard Maryssa quietly shove the bolt home. His head fell forward, his brow resting against the rough wood, as a strange sense of shyness and uncertainty filtered through his desperation. It was as if, in resisting that first impulse to catch Maryssa in his arms and hold her, he had lost the chance forever. He could feel those changeable eyes on him, pleading silently, so beautiful, but he didn't know what to say to her now, didn't know what to do.

There was a rumpling sound of paper being lifted, then a silence that seemed to stretch into eternity, drawing at Tade's wire-taut nerves until he felt he would snap. He turned his head to look at her. The map he had drawn hung limply from her fingers. Her rich hair spilled over the smudged parchment, the lustrous sable strands dripping in a silken stream over a bodice cut so low it tempted a man to taste of the treasures swelling above the narrow lace. It was a gown such as he'd never seen on Maryssa before, a gown designed to turn a man's loins to flame. But though he wanted her, needed her warmth with a desperation that terrified him, he stood frozen, one hand on the splintered window ledge.

"Tade . . ."

He had heard her speak his name a thousand times before, but the pain and terror infused in it as she lifted her gaze from the map twisted his belly with anguish and longing. And when his eyes caught the tear-dewed blue-gold of hers, saw the quivering of her sweet, innocent lips, Tade uttered a cry, lunged across the space that divided them, and caught her in a crushing, hopeless embrace.

He heard a sob catch in her throat, felt her hands delving deep into his hair, her lips upon his jaw and eyelids, her face against his, moist with tears.

And he wanted to bury this nightmare of loss and pain in the wonder of this one woman's loving.

"Maura, you came. I need you so damn badly." His voice cracked as he felt a wetness on his cheeks and was unashamed as it dampened her warm lips. "They've captured Dev."

"I know, love."

"They're going to kill him, and I don't—don't know how to stop it." His shoulders shuddered, and he felt her hands tighten about him, fierce and loving. "Maura, I have to do something"

"Whist, now, whist." Her hand was trembling as it smoothed his brow and cheek, her fingers tugging him to the small bed that stood along the wall of the chamber. He felt her palms on his chest, pushing him gently backward until he sagged down upon the straw tick, the bed ropes creaking beneath him.

His arm tightened about her waist, pulling her with him, the slight weight of her body warming him. He hadn't know he was so cursed cold. He swallowed convulsively, opening his burning eyes to gaze into her face. "I was such a bastard the night of the fires," he choked out. "Didn't listen, didn't want to. It hurt so to hear you say we could never be together. It was as if someone had ripped the heart out of me, and I couldn't stop bleeding. And when I thought it was because you were a coward..."

He saw her flinch, her eyes turning to liquid opal. "Nay, Maura," he said, his fingers skimming the delicate curves of her face to assure himself she was truly there beside him, not some vision, some phantom that would melt away in his arms. "No woman who will dare the highroads at night to ride to her man when he faces trouble can be said to lack courage. It was not until that morning, at mass before Dev was taken, that I understood that to leave them without having given them another leader to shield them would have been to betray myself."

Her gaze skittered away, her mouth trembling. "It doesn’t matter," she murmured soothingly, her hands cool and gentle on his fevered cheek.

"Aye, it does matter." Tade pressed his fingertips against his pounding head. "When we learned about the soldiers, I thought I'd be dead before I could tell you how sorry I am. That I love—"

"Tade—" The name was a choked plea upon her lips, the anguish in her eyes stirring confusion and hurt in his belly.

He felt her drawing away from him and tightened his grip, needing desperately to ease whatever tore at her, to comfort her, drink in of comfort himself. "In all the years I rode as the Falcon I never feared death until this night. I didn't want to die without touching you once more, without making love to you, hearing you cry out in my arms . . . feeling your hands . . ." His throat knotted, and he pulled his gaze away from hers, letting his eyelids droop shut. “Such gentle hands," he rasped, gripping her fingers, pulling them to his lips. "Such gentle, loving hands in a world full of hate and lies."

He felt her body shudder, then stiffen. Trembling, he raised his face, cupping her tear-streaked cheeks in his palms. "Put your hands on me, Maura," he breathed just as he had in the dream-kissed tree castle an eternity ago. "Please. I need you to touch me."

Tears spilled from her lashes, a groan of anguish rose in her throat, and in her eyes Tade could sense that she was being torn in two. But she cried out, burying herself against his chest, her lips seeking him with a fierce desperation, her hands plunging beneath his half-open shirt. "Aye, Tade," she sobbed against his skin. "I'll love you."

His lips crushed hers, tasting the salt of tears, not knowing or caring whether it was the wetness of his own sorrow or hers upon his tongue. He felt a bittersweet hopelessness, because in his heart he knew this would be the last time he would ever know the beauty of this woman's love.

“Maura,” he groaned, his fingers battling with the fastenings of her gown, the skirts, the petticoats. Her breasts spilled into his hands, and he took one rosy crest between his lips, teething it to pebble hardness, suckling it until he heard her groan with pleasure. Yet his awareness of her response was hazed by the sensations her soft hands and mouth were wringing from his own body. Her nails raked at his shirt, tearing the thin lawn from his shoulders, her tongue wetting the hard bronzed curves she had bared.

He shivered as the garment fell away, reveling in the feel of her hands on his skin, losing himself in the heat of her nakedness as he brushed the last of her undergarments from between them. Her flesh was infinitely sweet, scented of wildflowers and midnight and love, and he wanted to trace with his lips and tongue every curve and hollow, every delicate blush of rose, so he might carry the memory with him when he danced this night with death.

He trailed hot kisses down the swell of breasts that were fuller than he remembered, skimming his teeth and tongue across the delicate lengths of her ribs. But as he neared the sweet down nestled between her thighs, he felt Maryssa's hands forcing him upward, urging him onto his back. He started to protest, but her voice drifted to him, penetrating the silken webs of passion engulfing him.

"Nay, Tade. Let me."

He rolled onto his back, the coarse sheets abrading his passion-fevered skin. Her hair spilled in waves of warm mahogany across his chest; her fingers were gentle, maddening, as they unfastened his breeches. His shaft throbbed, straining against the binding cloth, burning for the brush of those soft, slender fingers. Then she freed him, working the breeches down, raining kisses upon the hardened, hair-roughened flesh of his thighs.

Tade groaned, catching at the tangled tresses pooled upon his skin, wanting to drag her up into his arms, bury himself inside her, but she pulled away. She raised her gaze to his and held his eyes for an instant that seemed to stretch into eternity.

"This one time," she whispered, "let me . . . let me give you . . .”

The words drifted to silence, but Tade gritted his teeth, every muscle in his body snapping wire-taut as she lowered her luminous eyes to his hardened flesh. Slowly, so slowly, she bent down, her lips breath-soft on his taut belly. "Tade." His name was a sob on the lips that were hurling him toward insanity. "I love you. Believe me. You have to believe that I do."

The first touch of her tongue on his white-hot shaft sent a jolt of raw pleasure into Tade's very soul, and as she loved him, pleasured him, something deep within his heart burst. It was a gift, wondrous and whirling, yet with every movement of her tongue, hands, and mouth he sensed in her a desperation and hopelessness. He arched his head back, the rage she had loosed in his loins drowning the confusion that had assailed him.

With a groan he grasped her arms, drawing her up his body. "Maura,” he choked. "I need to . . . to bury myself inside you." He swept her beneath him, felt her soft thighs open to cradle his hips. She was crying, he knew, as he probed the wet heat that beckoned him, crying, not in passion, but as if she had lost something precious. But they
were
losing something precious, both of them. They were losing a love so sweet it defied the very angels, losing a life they might one day have built together, losing the children that might have been conceived of their loving.