Lois Greiman (12 page)

“Why did you come?” he asked, and stepped up close. She didn’t move away, though it was entirely possible she couldn’t, for her back was against the wall, literally and figuratively. “So you could guard my back?”

She snorted. “Believe this,” she said. “I’d call them down on you as soon as breathe.”

“Then why didn’t you?”

“Jack seems to have developed a fondness for you.” Her eyes snapped with anger.

“So you came on his behalf.”

She glanced fretfully out the door. “I feared he might attempt to help you.”

“I had no idea you knew him so well.”

“And I had no idea you knew him at all.”

“Life is full of mysteries.”

“They say death is the ultimate one. Do you plan to stay and find out?”

He ignored her gibe. “So you only came to make sure the boy was safe?”

She raised an inquisitive brow. “Why else, Dancer?”

“’Tis what I ask myself. At the first you tried to be rid of me. Was it because you detested me or because you protected me?”

“I detested you,” she said. “Same as now.”

“And why is that?”

She looked back at him. There was something hypnotic about her gaze, as if she could stun with nothing but her eyes. “You’re weak,” she said simply.

“So it’s weakness you detest?”

“Weakness,” she said, “will get you killed.”

He smiled in the darkness and moved a step closer. “I’m not dead yet,” he breathed.

She turned toward him. Their faces were inches apart, her eyes snapping. “Through no fault of yours.”

“No. The fault is entirely yours. I merely wonder why,” he said, reaching up and brushing his knuckles across her cheek.

For a moment, he thought she trembled, but in an instant she’d stepped away.

“Lay a hand on me again, Dancer, and I’ll have to kill you,” she said, but her voice was strangely breathy.

He watched her lips move. “I don’t think you would.”

“Whyever not?” she asked, as though truly fascinated, and he shrugged.

“It seems like a good deal of bother,” he said, turning his hand slightly and lightly grasping her fingers in his, “for a weakling such as myself.”

“You’re daft.”

“All the more reason to wonder,” he said, and leaned closer.

She tightened her grip in warning.

“No hands,” he whispered, and kissed her.

Her lips were soft and yielding beneath his. Her fingers trembled against his chest. He shifted closer, unable to bear any distance between them. His erection brushed her abdomen. She moaned, and it was that noise, that tiny whisper of passion that ripped hot excitement into every part of his being.

Need roared through him. He dragged her up against
him and realized her hands were no longer passive, but were squeezing his buttocks, pulling him closer with frenzied heat.

He groaned and, dropping his head, kissed the soft flesh of her bosom.

But in that instant she jerked out of his grasp, breathing hard and looking terrified. “I told you not to touch me!”

He stared as his body screamed in frustration. “But you were just—”

“Get out of here,” she said. “Go back where you came from.”

“I came from the Den.”

“Damn you!” she snarled. “Why do you wish to die?”

Memories rushed in like a dark tide. But everything had changed. “I don’t,” he said. “Not anymore.”

“Then you shouldn’t be here.”

“But you’re doing such a grand job of protecting me.”

“I’m not protecting you.”

“Then why did you come?” he asked, and though he knew better than to ask, he could not help himself. “Do you…Might you have feelings for me?”

“Feelings!” She laughed, low and raspy. “Why would I have feeling for a man with naught but tortured eyes and foolish…” She paused, breathing hard.

He waited, breathless. “Foolish what, lass.”

“Foolish…” She scowled, glancing nervously toward the door. “Foolish notions. Trying to save others.” Her gaze flickered back, haunted and mercurial. “When you can’t even save yourself.”

He dared a careful step closer, watching her, thinking. “Gem would have saved herself.”

She winced at the memory, as if it hurt her. “Ox is an animal,” she whispered.

Dear God, she was beautiful, and he wanted her with an intensity that ached, but there was something to be learned here, something to figure out. “Is that why you came then, Princess? Do you think you owe me?”

“Hardly!” She laughed. The sound was breathy.

“Then why?”

She lifted her perfect chin with a jolt. “I came for the chest.”

“The—”

“The chest,” she hissed, and pointed to where it lay nearly hidden beneath the manger.

He glanced in that direction. “Why—”

“Because Poke wants it,” she said, leaning in. “Perhaps you think me foolish enough to let you gain his trust, his gratitude. But I am not.”

He felt battered, uncertain. “You came to find the chest?” he repeated, peering at her and trying, against all likely odds, to calm himself. He’d never liked emotions, wasn’t comfortable with them. And he detested passion. It made fools of men, and worse. Far worse. He was the cool baron of Landow—never rash or reckless or foolhardy. Indeed, it had been half an eternity since he had been aroused to this degree, and now it seemed unlikely that his member would ever retract. It ached, in fact. “Because you want to give it to Poke yourself.”

“Yes.”

He tried again to calm himself, but he was throbbing. “Because you detest me.”

“Yes.”

He grabbed her arm and stepped up close before she could escape again. Her breast brushed his chest. She gasped, and he gritted his teeth against the contact. “Forgive me,” he said, and kissed her.

Her knees seemed to buckle, but he had already
wrapped his arm around her back and drawn her up tight against his chest. She moaned in his embrace, and he drew back, breathing hard and eyeing her in the darkness.

“But it doesn’t seem as if you detest me,” he murmured.

“You imagine things,” she whispered, and shifted out of his grasp.

He dropped his gaze to her breasts, pale in the silent darkness. “More than you know.”

She moved back a step, as if fearful he might pounce.

“So you feel nothing when I kiss you?” he asked.

She remained silent, eyes wide.

“And you feel nothing,” he said again, “when I kiss you?”

“Nothing at all,” she rasped, and pivoting about, rushed away.

Will watched her go, watched the night swallow her up, felt his body drain of energy. Exhaling heavily, he let himself sink against the thick timbers behind him.

So it had finally happened. He’d completely lost his mind. What the devil was he doing? Pretending to be what he was not. Stealing! And if that wasn’t enough, he was now forcing his attentions on a woman who had no interest in him. He tightened his fist against the golden straw. The baron of Landow had never been so crass. Of course, the baron had never cared enough to be crass.

But wasn’t that better? Wasn’t the self-imposed apathy preferable to this terrible torture of feeling?

An image of Princess appeared in his mind, her eyes snapping, her body atremble.

No. Apathy was not better. Not anymore. He chose life. And yet…He drew a slow breath. She felt nothing
for him. In fact, she’d risked her life to keep him from acquiring the very thing he’d risked his to obtain.

But…He glanced toward the manger, spied the chest nestled in the straw, and smiled into the darkness. Apparently, she’d forgotten her reasons for coming.

S
handria huddled in the fetid darkness. The air was chill. Her breath curled like ghostly images over her head, but it was not foolish apparitions that she feared. It was the denizens of Darktowne. True, most of them knew she was Poke’s companion and let her pass unmolested. But she was still a good way from the Den, and there was a stranger on the streets. She watched him from the layered shadows of a tumbledown ale house. He was a giant of a man, his rumbling voice barely audible in the darkness.

“I’ve no quarrels with ye, lads,” he said.

“Don’t you now?” Someone chuckled. She thought it might be Frank. A pistol gleamed in his hand. Poke’s guards were numerous and well armed. “Do you hear that, Brandy? The brute ’ere says he ain’t got no quarrels with us.”

“’Tis good to hear,” snorted the other, and stepped away from an unsteady inn. Watery moonlight shone dully on the cutting edge of his curved sword. “But Poke may ’ave a quarrel with ’im.”

“Poke.” The stranger turned slightly, following Brandy’s movements. “Is he your master then?”

“I ain’t got no master, Brute. I do what I will when I will.”

“Mayhap you can help me then.” His tone was deadly calm. “I’m looking for someone.”

“Someone?”

“A lass,” he rumbled, and the others chortled.

“Yeah, ain’t we all.”

“Her hair is chestnut hue. A wee mite of a thing, no more than six-and-ten years.”

Frank chuckled. “You like your whores young, old man?”

Silence slipped into the night for a moment, then, “She’s no whore,” rumbled the stranger.

“Then you come to the wrong place. Cuz that’s all that lives ’ere. Ain’t that right, Frank?”

“Aye,” said the other, “though ’is description sounds like Poke’s little strumpet.”

The giant turned and, even in the darkness, Shandria could sense his tension. “Where would I find her?” he asked.

“Well now, there’s the funny thing,” Brandy said, and raised his sword. “You wouldn’t.”

The stranger turned slightly. “Think now,” he warned, his tone steady as the earth. “Don’t be doing something you’ll regret, lad.”

“Cocky bastard!” hissed Frank, and raised the gun.

Shandria tried to scream, tried to warn him. But everything happened in an instant. Brandy leapt forward, hacking wildly. The giant grunted. A gun exploded. Then there was silence, and only one man left standing.

Shandria gasped and the giant turned as if listening. She pressed her knuckles to her mouth, stifling any noise and shrinking deeper into the shadows. But he didn’t search for her. Instead, he wobbled slightly, as if wounded, then turned and headed north, toward the Den.

Who was he? What did he want? Slipping from her hiding place, Shandria hurried down a rutted street, then ducked into a narrow alley. It smelled of dead fish and worse, but she had no time to consider such things. A giant had come. A giant searching for a young girl with red hair. Gem. But why? What had she done? She was just a child. But perhaps he wasn’t an enemy. Perhaps he’d come to save her.

Shandria’s heart bumped in her chest. Maybe there was hope for one of them. Maybe. But the giant hadn’t yet reached the Den, and it would be all but impossible for him to battle his way through Poke’s labyrinth of guards. Impossible for him to reach Gemini alive.

Unless he had help.

The journey back to the Den chilled Will’s bones and tortured his muscles. Even with the coat he’d confiscated, the damp chill seeped in like old ghosts, haunting and raw.

The back alleys were as dark as sin. Furtive noises sounded from a dozen creepy sources. His fingers felt cramped and numb against the smooth frozen wood of the chest, but he trudged along, his mind wandering jerkily. What had he just stolen? Jewels? Coin? Or was it perhaps something entirely different?

Princess said Poke had his fingers in a hundred different pies. That he was involved in politics. Perhaps he should check the contents. Perhaps he should learn what it was Poke wanted so badly, but the chest was locked and Poke, with his lazy eyes and unreadable expressions, would surely know if someone had tampered with his prize. Then again, there was no reason he truly had to return to the Den. Maybe Princess was right. Maybe Poke
was involved in politics, and the contents of this chest was something the crown should see. But William already knew he would not force the lock, would not risk the chance of making Poke more suspicious of him.

Perhaps Poke was pivotal in some international scheme. Shandria had suggested as much. Maybe she was right. Perhaps Poke was as omnipotent as a demigod, or perhaps her words were just the sentiments of a woman in the inescapable bonds of love.

Pain coiled in his stomach. Did she love Poke and detest Will? Perhaps. Who could say? The Den’s master must seem all-powerful to one in her position, while the man she called Dancer would appear to be nothing more than a hapless oaf. One who couldn’t even manage to perform a simple theft unaided.

So she had helped him. Why? Did she pity him? Desire him? Despise him? The questions haunted him. Someone chuckled from the anonymity of the shadows. Will hunched his back against the eerie feelings and hurried on, but even the ever-present danger of Darktowne could not quite keep his mind from clattering back to the silver-eyed woman.

It was impossible to see past the mercurial coolness of her gaze. Impossible to divine her thoughts. But when had he ever cared to do such a thing? He’d spent most of his life keeping others out.

And now he found, inexplicably, foolishly, that he wanted to let someone in. To understand. To be understood.

And the amusing part was that she wanted nothing of the sort.

Wealth and power. Apparently that’s what she desired. And Poke possessed both. He had dozens of guards, or so she’d said. Was it true?

As William drew closer to the Den, he slowed his pace, watching the shadows from the corner of his eyes and wondering where those men might be hidden, but no one stopped him. Indeed, no one so much as asked his intentions.

It was nearly dawn when he stumbled down the last alley toward his destination. Tension lay tight between his shoulders, for there was no guessing what his reception might be. Perhaps, in fact, Princess had told Poke of Will’s inability to seize the chest himself. Perhaps he was no longer welcome in that questionable refuge. And what of Jack? What was his role in this drama? And why had he appeared at Pentmore? Perhaps the lad, too, had hoped to steal the chest himself. Or perhaps…Perhaps, against all odds, the boy worried for Will’s safety. It was impossible to guess, for his world had turned upside down and everything was as it had never been before.

A moan issued from the shadows and a voice rose, gravelly and unsteady. “Who goes there?”

William turned warily, searching the darkness, and a man lurched forward, knife in hand.

“Who the devil goes there?” he snarled again, but in an instant the fellow dropped his back against the nearest wall and slid with weary lethargy to a seated position. The bloody blade wobbled.

Will waited, breath held.

“I’ll kill ’er for this.” His words were muddled, his head beginning to list toward his tilted shoulder.

Something cranked up in Will’s gut. Fear and suspicion ground up with something more. “Kill who?” he asked.

“She’s already dead,” the man slurred, and drooped sideways.

“Who are you going to kill?” Will asked, premonition
pumping into his system as he took two rapid steps toward the downed man.

“Already dead,” he repeated. “She just don’t know it.” The weapon dropped from his hand, and he slumped sideways, sliding regretfully against the moldering wall behind him.

Will strode forward, but the other was already dead. He knew it without question, though he didn’t know how. And suddenly silvery eyes glimmered like twin beacons in his mind. He turned without thought; and then he was running, racing down the alley and up the stairs to the foreboding sanctuary.

The front door stood open. Will stumbled to a halt. Caution returned with a jolt. Voices sounded from within, one low and smooth, one gritty and tight with excitement.

Oxford.

William made his way up the stairs. His movements were slow and wary, his heart heavy as molten lead in his chest, but he forced himself to step inside. Even through the doorway of the shabby entry he could see that the parlor was crowded with people; but they didn’t notice him, for they were busy with another—a stranger who stood in the center of the ring, barely visible past those who surrounded him.

“’E’s a spy.” It was Oxford’s voice again, as subilant as a snake’s. “Come to learn our secrets.”

Will’s heart clenched tight in his chest. Were they talking about him? His steps hitched.

“We don’t know that.” Gem’s words were cropped short, wound up tight. The fear was palpable.

“No.” Poke’s voice was typically calm. Will could see his face past the shoulder of a man he failed to recognize. His smile was serene, but there was something in his eyes,
an eager brightness as he turned with predatory premonition to find Will through the doorway. “We don’t. Yet another mystery, aye, Mister Slate.”

A half dozen faces turned toward him. There was nothing for it but to enter the room, to creep in with careful strides, though he hoped to God he looked casual. Meeting Poke’s gaze took all the strength he could muster, but the other only smiled.

“Look,” Poke said and nodded sideways. “We are blessed with yet another guest.”

William glanced to his right, and there, near the center of the room was a bear of a man. He stood well over six feet and was as broad as sundown. He wore a Highlander’s dark kilt belted over a rough tunic and little else but for laced boots that barely contained the muscles that strained like living roots from his thighs and calves.

Blood was matted in his hair and dripped in darkening hues down his temple. There was a gash in his right forearm from which blood dropped in rhythmic cadence. The knife in Oxford’s hand was the same ruddy hue. He grinned as he shifted the blade and circled the giant.

A curse echoed unbidden from Will’s lips.

Poke raised a brow. “Might you know our large intruder, Mister Slate?”

“No.” Honesty came quickly if a bit gutturally to his lips. “We’ve not met.”

“Then he did not come on your behalf?”

Nausea cranked at Will’s stomach. “No? Why would he?”

“Why indeed? And however did he get past my faithful guards?” Poke smiled as he paced. Oxford growled as he did the same. Opposite him were two others, men Will had never met, but they looked to be the same ilk as Oxford—quick, hard, and cruel to the bone.

“Will you answer?” Poke asked, but the giant merely stared, his eyes expressionless as they followed the other about the room.

“I don’t think…” Gem darted her eyes back and forth. “I don’t believe ’e can talk.”

“Truly? A mute?” Poke mused. “Perhaps he’s had his tongue removed. A barbaric tradition from times past, I know, but sometimes ’tis still done, is it not, Mr. Oxford?”

The Irishman licked his lips and almost giggled. “Aye, sometimes it is.”

“Are you missing your tongue, Goliath?”

The giant didn’t answer, but watched Poke with narrow, solemn eyes.

“Why are you here?”

He said nothing.

“’E can’t talk,” Gem rasped. “’E’s daft. I’m sure of it.”

Poke smiled. “Daft enough to slip past my guards? That I doubt. But even if that were the case, why would he go to such trouble? What is your business here, Goliath?”

Still no sound came from the man at the center of the room. But he turned slightly, following Poke’s movement, and with that motion Oxford and his cohorts tensed like dodging terriers. It was then that Will realized that one held a club of sorts while the other carried a long, wicked blade. It was curved like a scimitar and etched with foreign letters.

Strange how every detail seemed sharp and significant to Will’s bombarded senses. Strange, when life hung by a thread. He could sense death crowding in, could feel it like the cold. But it would not be quick, and it would not be painless. Oxford circled his prey, eyes gleaming.

Bile burned Will’s throat. “Perhaps he has no business here,” he said, and found himself barely able to force out the words. “Perhaps he simply stumbled into our midst.”

“As you did?” Poke asked.

Shut up now. Before it’s too late
. “Yes,” he said, “much the same.”

Poke canted his head. “You’re certain you’ve not met him before?”

The giant’s gaze met his and held, but it was impossible to read anything there. Perhaps Gem was right. Perhaps he was daft. Perhaps he was a deaf mute. But he was also a mountain of a man, bulging with muscle and potential danger.

“I would remember,” Will said, and Poke laughed.

“Yes, he would stick in your memory, would he not, young Gemini?”

Her eyes were as wide as eternity, her face pasty white. “Aye, Master Poke, I surely wouldn’t forgot a bloke like ’im ’ad I met ’im before.”

He smiled at her. “You look worried, lass.”

Her lips trembled. “I don’t wanna see no one get ’urt.”

“No.” He touched her cheek with gentle fingertips. “The softness of a woman, but it’s a harsh world, my dear. We cannot let anyone breach our fair fortress, can we?”

“’E ain’t breached nothin’,” she breathed, her eyes flickering from the master to the giant like a cornered hare. “’E just stumbled in.”

“That’s not what Mr. Oxford thinks.”

“Devil take ye!” gritted the Irishman, and lunging forward, thrust his blade into the Highlander’s side.

The man grunted and spun about, but Ox was already out of reach and grinning. Blood soaked the back of the giant’s tunic and sank like a dark flood into his plaid.

“Is that right?” Poke’s voice was perfectly steady, as if he were discussing the price of tea over crumpets and not watching a man slowly lose his life’s blood. “Are you a spy, Mister Goliath?”

He didn’t answer, but turned, watching Poke again with steady eyes.

“Who sent you?”

The silence was as heavy as death, the quiet only broken by Oxford’s raspy breathing.

“Reticence will do you no good,” Poke said, his voice almost sorrowful now. “Indeed, if you spill the truth I may well let you live, but if you do not…” He raised his hands, palms up, and Oxford leapt in again.