The Landlord's Black-Eyed Daughter (33 page)

When she returned to the White Hart, Tim said, “Lord Stafford hisself rode in a while ago. He asked fer ye, Mistress.”

“Damn! He said he would visit, but I forgot.”

“He's still inside, waitin'.”

Elizabeth sighed. She had raced Rhiannon across the moors for hours and the mare was tired. Another ride was out of the question, so she'd just have to face Walter and make it very clear that his presence was unwelcome.

What would he threaten her with this time? Dorothea had said something about the prosperity of Wyndham Manor. “Cozy and prosperous,” she had said.

But Elizabeth had not wed Walter. Did he hold the deed to the manor? Would he now hold it over her head?

Nonsense. He had sworn he hated her, not once but many times. And yet last night he had said that he was old and tired and meant her no harm. What new tricks did he have up his sleeve?

With trepidation, she neared the inn's garden. A flock of ravens scattered into the wind. Startled, Elizabeth followed their dark flight above the roof.

From a window on the second floor, a movement caught her attention. Two faces hovered there. One belonged to a woman with pale, unbound hair. The other face, bearded, was framed by curly hair, black as the ravens that dotted the sky. The bearded man was looking up, but the mournful woman seemed to be staring at Elizabeth.

In an attempt to better examine the faces, Elizabeth shaded her eyes. She was too far away and the slant from the sun precluded seeing every feature clearly, yet the woman's unbound hair distressed her. The White Hart employed four maids and they all wore their hair tucked inside mob caps.

Elizabeth gathered up her skirts and ran for the inn. She stumbled up the stairs and flung open the door.

The room was empty. It wasn't large enough to hide anyone and nothing appeared disturbed.

Elizabeth shook her head. “'Tis the brandy,” she whispered.

Yes… perhaps the brandy had caused her to envision faces that weren't there.

With a start, she realized that the air inside the bedroom was cold enough to make her bones ache. Racing downstairs, she headed for the front door.

Walter grasped her by the arm, halting her flight.

“Elizabeth! What ails you? You ran down those steps as if pursued by demons.”

“I swear I saw someone upstairs, but the room is empty. Did you see a fair-haired woman with a delicate, oval face? She had a haunted look to her.”

“I've seen nobody matching that description.”

“Did you send someone to spy on me? A woman? Perhaps a man as well?”

“Why would I do such a thing?”

Her gaze skimmed his body and face, looking for any sign of pretense. His feet didn't shuffle. Above his goatee, his mouth was drawn rather than set in a taunting sneer. His eyes remained impassive, nary one trace of the hypocritical piety she'd come to recognize so well.

She drew a calming breath. “Forgive me, my lord. I know 'tis rude, but I feel ill and must retire.”

Walter glanced at his pocket watch. “'Tis eventide, Elizabeth. Perhaps a glass of wine?”

“No, thank you.” Wine was the last thing she needed. “Good night, my lord. I mean, good afternoon. In truth, I don't know what I mean.”

Eyes blurred by sudden tears, she turned away from him, stumbled down the hallway, entered her bedroom, and swiftly locked the door.

Then she stretched out on the bed and for the first time in months slept deeply, dreamlessly, without any fear at all.

Ranulf and Janey!

Ranulf and Janey had been the faces at the window.

Had she been less fatigued, less fuddled by brandy, she would have recognized them immediately.

Rising from her bed, Elizabeth removed her crumpled riding attire and donned a wrapper. So, two ghosts now inhabited the White Hart.

Strange. The thought did not disturb her. On the contrary, it comforted her. With Rand gone, Ranulf and Janey had come to watch over her, protect her, and she now understood that Janey had been trying to convey an urgent message.

Nonsense. Ghosts often appeared, and sometimes they moved from place to place, but they never spoke.

Even Padfoot didn't bark.

Elizabeth had no idea what time it was. Perhaps she'd slept ten hours, perhaps five. When had she sought the sanctuary of her bedroom? Three o'clock? Four? “Eventide,” Walter had said.

Now it was night. She had missed dinner but she wasn't hungry, and she wondered if she'd ever be hungry again.

The wind prowled outside her room and slammed her shutters against the walls. Walking over to the window and peering through, she saw Tim's shadow when he passed what he called “the barn's winnock.” Beyond the stables, the silver highway wended its way across purple moors, as if spun from moonbeams.

Hedges shook while trees waved their bony branches at the sky's tattered clouds. Moonlight spilled upon the clouds, which crested, swirled, and changed shapes.
Death and his huntsmen,
she thought.
Death and his hellhounds galloping across the face of the moon.

She had heard such tales as a child. How Death sat astride his mighty horse, blasting his horn to mark the hunt. How Death and his sky-riders scavenged the night, seeking yet another harvest of victims.

Elizabeth shivered. Seated at her dressing table, she brushed her hair. “One, two, three,” she whispered. It was impossible to think and count strokes at the same time. “Seven, eight, nine…” Perhaps it
was
possible, for she could not dismiss the deadly sky-riders. “Twelve, thirteen… damn!”

The wind rapped at her window pane. Its cries swirled around the White Hart's corners and crevices like the shrill of a banshee. She imagined a banshee, a bone-thin woman with long hair and eyes streaming blood, drifting in the air beyond the window, searching for the inhabitant whose death was imminent.

“God's breath! Banshees and sky-riders. I must stop this.”

A whistle pierced the room. Elizabeth dropped her brush.
The wind,
she thought,
screeching like a banshee, and now whistling like Rand.
She rose, then sank back onto her chair.

A second whistle.

“Don't do this to yourself,” she admonished. “Don't respond to every gust of wind, every strange noise.”

The whistle sounded a third time.

Slowly, as if sleepwalking, Elizabeth rose from her chair and approached the window. Opening it, she leaned far out over the casement.

Rand was below, astride his black stallion.

She blinked several times. The wind skittered shadows across the rider's face. She rubbed her eyes. The moon dipped behind a cloud. When it reappeared, he was still there. “Rand?”

“None but, my love.”

Oh God,
this
ghost spoke. “It cannot be you,” she said calmly, rationally, even though every instinct urged her to scream or swoon. “You are dead. They tarred you, then raised you in chains.”

“Who said so?”

“Walter. He swore—”

“He lied, Bess. Save for Billy's absence, everything went as planned.” In the moonlight, Rand smiled. “But it takes a wee bit out of a man, coming back from the dead.”

Yet uncertain, she gazed down at him. He might be a dream or he might be a vision. She mistrusted her senses, mistrusted the joy and relief racing inward.

“I waited for you, Bess, every night at the peel tower. I even rode into the courtyard once, thinking you might be at your bedroom window. Then I saw you return from York with Stafford.” He darted a glance toward the highway. “I was most diligent at my post, sweetheart.”

Rising in his stirrups, Rand caught a strand of her hair and kissed it. “Come to me now and welcome my return. We have some catching up to do.”

He
sounded
like Rand. Still only half believing, Elizabeth climbed out through the window and dropped to the ground. “You look like Rand,” she whispered.

Laughing, he lifted her up and settled her across his saddle. He didn't smell of the grave, nor was he cold. On the contrary, he was blessedly warm. She snaked her arms around his chest and snuggled her head beneath his coat of claret velvet.

“I can't believe it,” she said, and even to her own ears, her voice sounded half soppy, half reverential. “After all my pain, to think you are truly alive.”

Rand's arms tightened around her. “How could you doubt? I'll die when I'm ready and not one moment before.”

At another time she might have argued, but now she merely raised her head to accept Rand's embrace. His lips brushed her eyelids, the tip of her nose, her cheeks and chin.
This is a dream,
she thought. Her fingers crept up beyond the lace at his throat, for she wanted to feel where the rope had scarred him.

Rand caught her hand. “Don't. Please. My neck is still sore. I have a welt as thick as my wrist.”

“Does it pain you?”

“Much less than the alternative.”

“Always you tease.” She dotted his face with kisses.

The stallion snorted and danced.

“Dismount,” Rand murmured against Elizabeth's mouth. “This was
not
one of my better ideas.” He placed her bare feet upon the ground. “Your room—”

“Is cold. The fire's out and there's no wood. Horace Exe, the new innkeeper, is frightfully frugal.”

“Together we shall light a new fire.” Rand swung down from the saddle, shed his coat, tethered his stallion to a tree, then hoisted her through the window. Graceful as a cat, he followed her inside.

It was the first time he had ever entered her room and the sight of Rand dwarfing her furniture brought home the reality, as did the slant of his lips on hers. His kiss was feather-soft, but gradually he intensified the contact until her mouth opened and his tongue began to plunder. Dimly, she realized that she hovered between awareness and oblivion, ecstasy and torment.

Shuddering violently, she stumbled backwards and began to weep. Rand pulled her into his arms and pressed her face against his chest. His fingers rubbed the small of her back.

“You were d-dead,” she sobbed, “and I wanted to d-die too, just like Janey.”

“I know,” he soothed. “I know, my love. I couldn't get word to you right away. I wanted to—”

“But Walter would have sensed my joy,” she finished, lifting her face, the tears still coursing down her cheeks. “I'm not that good an actress.” With a tremulous sigh, she reached for the tinder box.

Rand stilled her hand. “The moon shall be our lantern,” he said. “Ah, Bess, I've been hungry for the sight of you.”

“Just the sight?” she asked with mock indignation.

“No. I missed the sound of your laughter. I missed the taste of your breath. Most of all, I missed your body next to mine. I've always loved you, but I never realized how much until we were separated. 'Twas the lack of your closeness that made me a prisoner, not the bars on my cell.” Removing her wrapper, he palmed her breasts.

She felt her body melt like the tallow on a candle. “Rand, I can't stand up.”

His answer was to draw her against the unyielding wall of his chest. Easing her chin up, he began an assault on her lips. Elizabeth's frantic grasp captured his shoulders. The muscles rippling beneath her fingers felt warm and firm. And alive.

He encircled her waist, his fingers digging into her bottom. Then he brought her up hard, grinding their hips together. Once again, his mouth met hers in a kiss that left her breathless.

His kiss deepened as he scooped her up into his arms. Placing her on the bed, he followed her descent, until she was pinned beneath him. Her mother's quilt felt soft against her back. Her pillow cradled her head, its pliant down nuzzling her cheeks. The contrast of Rand's roughened palms and the feathery pillow, both pressing against her flushed face, brought forth a blissful moan.

He halted to divest himself of his boots and clothing. His body lifted and wriggled, as if he purposely timed his movements for the optimum impact.

Elizabeth savored each tantalizing inch of him. “You're cast from steel,” she sighed, her legs spreading beneath the urgent press of his knee.

“Steel can be tempered by fire, my love.”

“True,” she murmured, aware that
she
was on fire. A torrid blaze traveled throughout her body, inciting an almost volcanic tremor between her legs. Her skin smoldered at Rand's every caress, and he never stopped, never rested.

Fondling, petting, stroking, he ignited flame after flame; a conflagration that was so intense, she wondered if she could possibly survive.

She felt his hand creep up her thighs, then cup her mons, and a sharp cry of pleasure broke from her lips. He swallowed that cry, then another, his mouth possessing hers so thoroughly, she couldn't tell where his breath left off and hers began.

Rand's lips moved lower, his tongue darting out every so often to lick the strained arch of her neck. He found the pulse that beat wildly at the base of her throat, and his lips pressed hard against the erratic throb.

Eyes shut, Elizabeth writhed beneath him, but he pinioned her wrists, holding her upper body motionless. His lips moved again, and this time he found her breasts. She felt his tongue sear first one nipple, then the other. Her head thrashed from side to side while whimpers of delight forced their way up her throat.

In the midst of her passion, a vise of fear clamped her heart. From somewhere deep inside, rage cut across her desire. She jerked one wrist free from his grip and lashed out with an angry sweep of her arm, pushing him away.

Letting go her other wrist, Rand pressed his palms against the mattress and raised himself up. “What's wrong?”

“This. You think to reward me for my days of anguish.”

“I think to reward us both. Why does that pain you?”

“Afterwards you'll leave me,” she cried, as she wondered who was speaking. Bess or Janey?

“I cannot promise to stay by your side like a faithful dog,” Rand said, “nor would you want me thus. Perhaps you consider our lovemaking an atonement, Bess, but I consider it a rare gift.”

At his words, desire once again clouded her mind. Drawing him down to her, Elizabeth licked his nipples, alternately circling and suckling the taut nubs.

Beginning anew, Rand caressed.
Dorothea's wrong,
thought Elizabeth, her head whirling.
Love isn't a conscious choice. 'Tis a rare gift.

“Please! Now!” she cried.

At her urgent command, Rand penetrated. When she would have drawn her legs together, he kept them apart, rising slightly, pressing the heels of his hands gently but firmly against her inner thighs.

“Now,” she pleaded.

Releasing her legs, Rand began to thrust.

Elizabeth recalled her earlier task, brushing her hair.

One, two, three.

Four, five, six.

Seven, eight, nine.

They would never reach twelve, she thought, as the rhythm of Rand's thrusts increased. She would die from ecstasy before they reached twelve.

She was right. They reached eleven.

*
**

Elizabeth ran her fingertips across Rand's face. “When I saw you on the gallows, I wished it could have been me.”

“You saw the hanging? I told you to stay away.”

“Directly after my prison visit, Walter captured me. Did Billy not tell you? Or is he still locked up?”

“No. He's free. But he didn't say one word about—”

“Perhaps he felt ashamed. He tried to come to my rescue, but was knocked unconscious for his efforts, poor lad.”

“That must be it, then. My cousin yearns to play the hero.”

“He doesn't have to
play
at being a hero. God knows what I would have done without his support during your trial. Billy has more strength of character than all my book heroes put together. I truly believe he would slay dragons for a damsel in distress… even if he didn't possess a sword.”

“Billy loves you, Bess, at least a little.”

“I cannot love a little, Rand. I must love wholeheartedly. 'Tis the way I am.” His chest hair tantalized her breasts as she rubbed against him. “Walter was here this evening, determined to give me the forty pound reward for your capture. Life looked so utterly bleak. I imagined banshees and sky-riders and—”

“Stafford was here, at the inn? Did he hand over the forty pounds?”

“No. I would never accept his blood money, not even if—”

“When did he leave?”

Rolling sideways, sitting up, she shrugged. “I don't know. I retired to my room. My guess is that Walter waited to see if I would sup. The food here is dreadful, but I rode all day, and Walter would assume I'd be ravenous. Don't fret, my love, he's long gone.”

“No, Bess. If Stafford tarried till seven, 'twas less than two hours ago. Was he alone?”

“Of course. He's killed every highwayman in England. Why should he fear the roads?”

“Stafford's out there by himself with my reward. God, what a stroke of luck!”

“Rand! Don't even think what you're thinking. You were just hanged for robbery, remember?”

“I was hanged for murder.” Rising from the bed, he lit the candle. “I still have a score to settle with your bloody beak. He killed Zak, he nearly succeeded in killing me, and he kept you a prisoner.” The candle's glow distorted Rand's eyes, causing them to shine more black than blue. “The world would be well rid of Walter Stafford and I, conscientious Englishman that I am, must not shirk my duty.”