The Official Essex Sisters Companion Guide (31 page)

Ewan called on Rosy every day, but Annabel had been busy with her family and had not yet visited the cottage. But the next morning he asked her to join him: “Not that I don’t enjoy Rafe and Tess and all the rest of them, but it would be nice to see you alone.”

“You do see me alone,” she said, smiling. “We are quite alone at the moment, for instance.” They were curled in bed together.

“But we’re never alone during the day,” Ewan said. “Before half of London descended on us, I used to see you in the morning.”

“But you work in the morning.”

“I would change my schedule for you.”

Annabel rolled away from him and hopped out of bed. “All right. I’d like to see Rosy. And I haven’t been on Sweetpea in days. The poor horse must think I’ve deserted her.”

“’Tis I who’ve been deserted. Here we’ve been married over a month, and already I never see you.”

She turned around and planted a kiss on his lips. “You stop all those Scottish lamentations,” she told him.

“Lack of sleep,” he said. “You sleep like a starfish, you know.”

“Like a what?”

“You’ve never seen one? They’re animals of the sea, with five arms spread out like the rays of a star.”

“You’ve seen one of these creatures?”

“Gregory has a dried one, bought from a trader who happened by. At any rate, every time I ease into sleep, you throw out your arms and legs and wake me up.”

“So that’s your excuse for all the times you have woken
me
up?” she asked impudently.

He grinned at her, enjoying the curve of her waist as she sat before her dressing table. Then he remembered. “We have to make a decision about Rosy.”

“Isn’t she happy in the cottage?”

“I am worried that she might wander away if her nurse turns her back. The cottage is one of those that are farthest out, so that no laborer is likely to stray by the place and frighten her, but if she were to walk into the forest, she might get lost.”

“Rafe is already talking of returning to London,” Annabel noted. “As soon as they’re gone, she can return to the castle.”

“But the children,” Ewan said, loving the thought of them more every moment.

“What children?” she asked absentmindedly, pushing a few more hairpins into the coils of her hair.

“Our children,” he said, watching her in the mirror.

Her face went very still. “Oh.” And then: “You think Rosy might grow dangerous toward children?”

“Felton also pointed out that she might be happier in a house that held only women.”

“Ah. That’s quite thoughtful of him.” And then: “Whatever you decide, Ewan. I don’t think it would be right for me to judge what happens to Rosy.”

But he’d made up his mind.

They had been riding for almost an hour when they finally reached a small clearing and the stone cottage where Rosy now lived.

“It’s lovely!” Annabel exclaimed. Rose briars curled up and over the threshold. The briars seemed to hang in a pink haze created by little coral buds; in a few weeks they would be heavy with blooms. The cottage lay dreaming in the sunshine, with no sound but that of bees, like a fairy-tale house belonging to a princess in disguise.

“Rosy likes it,” Ewan said. “I do believe she—” He stopped his horse suddenly and frowned.

“What is it?”

“I thought I saw someone on the ridge there. I’ve made it quite clear that no one is to approach the house.”

“I don’t see anything,” Annabel said. The hill behind the house was covered with gorse, and gorse was so scratchy to the legs that it was hard to believe anyone would willingly tramp through it. Horses loathed it.

“Must have been my imagination,” Ewan muttered, starting down the path to the cottage.

Annabel followed him, enjoying the way the buttercups gleamed through wavy grass, as if they were made of gold and had been polished by a footman. She glanced at Ewan’s back as he rode down the path before her. He would say that God was doing the polishing.

Not that she believed the way Ewan did, but she had to admit that the effect was beautiful.

They tied their horses at the side of the house and Ewan stepped aside to allow Annabel to enter the door before him.

One moment she was walking into the dusky coolness of the cottage, and the next a strong male arm whipped around her chest and jerked her to the side while a hand covered her mouth. She tried to scream, to take a breath, but the hand stifled her. A second later Ewan entered, head bent as he came through the low stone lintel. None of the three men in the room tried to physically control him. One simply leveled a long rifle at him.

Ewan looked quickly at Annabel and then backed against the stone wall as directed. “Where’s Rosy?” he barked at them, ignoring the rifle entirely.

These were ruffians with nothing in common with the robbers in London except their weapons. They were the kind of men who instill fear merely walking down the street: dirty, with filthy snarls of hair and a swaggering walk.

Annabel could see two men, neither of whom answered Ewan. One of them laughed, a coarse, raucous cough, and the other just stared at him with his mouth open, like a freshwater trout.

Then a fourth man lounged out of the door leading to the room beyond. He had a black beard and terrifying eyes, like black, shiny river rocks.

“Where is Rosy?” Ewan demanded again, looking to the man who entered.

“If by Rosy you mean the female yonder, she went a wee bit berserk on us, and we had to put her out. But she’ll be fine. The older woman may be a loss. She took quite a crack on the head. And you must be the laird of these parts.”

“I’m no laird,” Ewan said. “I’m the Earl of Ardmore, and you know it well. I would gather you’ve been living on my land.”

“’Tis true, ’tis true. I do know a bit about you, milord. For example, you’re quite the religious type, aren’t you?” He cast up his eyes, clearly enjoying himself. “Lord, forgive me for killin’ yon old lady in the next room. There.”

“Do you want money?” Ewan asked quietly, when it seemed that the leader had done with crossing himself and spitting.

“We never turn down a shilling, but we came here for a woman. We heard all about the pretty little duck you was keeping here in the cottage, the one you wouldn’t let anyone see. Course, there was a few things we didn’t know. That she was barmy, for one thing. And that you was the kind who brings the wife along to meet the mistress. Perverse, I call it. But then, I’m an old-fashioned man.”

“If you take Rosy,” Ewan said steadily, “I will hunt these hills until I find you, and I will take every single one of you, and you will hang until you are dead.” His eyes swept the four ruffians. Only the fishlike one showed a reaction. His eyes widened and he closed his mouth.

“You’d better start praying,” the leader said, sounding bored. “Because people have been searching for Black Haggis for years and they ain’t find him yet. And in case you’re wondering, I’m Black Haggis. Haven’t you heard of me?”

“Certainly. You’re wanted for murder. You’re also a coward, who once left your men in the hands of the village watch and ran for your life.”

“Ain’t you heard the one about how I killed me own mum? No? Disappointing. On to business. I reckon there’s a problem with yon Rosy. She’s a berserker as wouldn’t
keep a man’s bed warm because she’d have to be tied up. This one, though”—he nodded toward Annabel—“she’ll do nicely.”

Annabel’s stomach dropped into her feet. “No,” she gasped, or tried to, but her mouth was stifled by a large, dirty hand. She tried to twist free, but the man holding her just pulled her tightly against him.

Ewan didn’t even look in her direction. “You cannot hope to escape with the Countess of Ardmore. You will be hunted down within a matter of hours and killed.”

“No one knows these mountains the way I do,” Black Haggis said. “Fang, me lad, you’d do me a favor by taking out your pistol and leveling it at his lordship here. Seems to me that the man may try a bit of derring-do in order to rescue his wife, and two weapons is better than one.”

Fishlips snapped his mouth shut again, and a second later Ewan was being guarded by a deadly-looking pistol in addition to the rifle.

Annabel swallowed. She could stand this, if she had to. She could. Ewan would get her back. She wouldn’t go mad the way Rosy had.

“If I have to burn down every inch of pine on these mountains to find your hideout,” Ewan was saying, “I shall do so.” The look in his eyes would have made Annabel shiver, but Haggis didn’t flicker an eyelash.

“I’m afraid you won’t be around to make the attempt,” he said, turning toward the man holding Annabel. “Nisbit, I’ll thank you to tie up that lady you’re holding and get the crazed one, Rosy. I’m thinking that she’ll be good for one night at least.”

The man who was holding Annabel kept a hand over her mouth, but the other slid from her waist to her breast. And all of a sudden he was pressing against her from behind.
He was unmistakably—obscenely—aroused. He made a sound in his throat, and then started to move her toward the door by bucking against her backside to move her forward. His hand scrambled at her breast, squeezing it painfully.

Annabel’s vision went black. She couldn’t do it. She couldn’t be brave, she
would
go mad as Rosy had. All of a sudden she started struggling as hard as she could, bit the dirty fingers that covered her mouth, and kicked backward.

She heard an astonished
oof
, and then she was free of his stench and his arms and was running across the room, heading toward Ewan. But Black Haggis was laughing, and he put out his foot.

Annabel struck it and flew forward, off her feet, careened into the robber holding his pistol on Ewan. He dropped his weapon and she fell hard on top of it, knocking the breath out of her lungs. For a moment she just lay there, stunned by the pain in her breast where it struck the pistol. The only thing she could hear was Black Haggis’s coarse voice. “Damn it, Fang,” he growled, “you’re no better than a butterfingered lad. If you cost us our honey, I’ll floor you.

“All right. I think it’s time to put his lordship out of his misery.” He kicked Annabel in the side. “Your husband has done naught to save you, girl, although you show a pleasing bit of life yourself. You might want to remember that. Nisbit, take out his lordship,
if
you please.”

Just as the man who had been holding Annabel took a pistol from his pocket, Annabel launched herself from the floor and hurled toward Ewan, pressing the pistol she had been lying on into his palm.

“Where the hell is Fang’s—” Black Haggis exclaimed.

Ewan jerked the pistol up, toward Haggis, and a great burst of light and noise came out of it. Annabel screamed because the fire burned her arm. But at that same moment she saw a flash of movement from the doorway behind Haggis and, for a second, caught a glimpse of Rosy’s crazed face and her arms swinging something over her head.

Later Annabel decided there were two cracks of noise, sounding like an echo of each other. The one killed Haggis, and the other . . .

The one that killed Haggis was made by Rosy whacking him over the head with a firestone that she should never have been able to lift to her knees, let alone over her head.

And the second was the noise of Ewan’s pistol.

Fishlips jumped out the window. Ewan pushed Annabel aside and dashed forward. Annabel collapsed to her knees, holding her burned arm, her eyes blinded by tears. Then the man Haggis called Nisbit pocketed his gun and grabbed her other arm, yanking her so hard that she came to her feet.

“Ewan!” she cried.

Ewan looked around, grabbed Haggis’s abandoned pistol, and shot Nisbit without a second’s pause. The robber made a muffled sound and plummeted to the floor.

Annabel stood there, stunned, but then she started shuddering. Dark red blood was creeping along the floor toward her slippers so she stumbled toward Ewan.

He was kneeling on the floor, and now she saw for the first time what he was doing. He was holding Rosy.

“Oh God,” Annabel cried. “Oh no!”

Rosy had been shot in the heart. There was a surprisingly small wound, with not much blood. She had her eyes open and she was looking at Ewan. Her face had returned to its normal, peaceful expression.

“Oh God,” Annabel sobbed, falling to her knees beside the two of them.

Ewan was cradling Rosy against his chest, his head bent, and then Annabel saw he was crying. Ewan was crying.

She reached out and put a hand on Rosy’s forehead. It was cool, almost cold. Ewan was rocking Rosy back and forth now.

“Ewan,” she said, stilling him. Then she put her hand on Rosy’s forehead again and smiled at her. Rosy looked back, her gaze as innocent as any child’s. She seemed to feel no pain. The words that Imogen had repeated came back to her. “
In thee, O Lord, do I put my trust
,” she said to Rosy.

Ewan ran his hand along her cheek. “Rosy,” he said, his voice rough with tears. “Go with God. Let Him take you to a kinder place, where you can run free with no fear of men.”

Rosy smiled at him as if he’d asked her to a picnic, but she looked very tired, and her face was even whiter than it had been a moment ago.

“I love you,” Ewan whispered. “Gregory loves you too.”

She smiled again, faintly.

“Aye, lass, I’ll tell him you love him,” he said.

Annabel was crying so hard she could hardly see.

Rosy closed her eyes and then she opened them once more. Ewan was sobbing, holding her against his chest. “I’m so sorry, Rosy,” he said. “I didn’t mean to do it! I’d have killed myself first.”

“Ewan,” she said, her voice small but clear. It was like a blessing. Then she closed her eyes and Annabel knew she wouldn’t open them again.

Ewan’s head was bent over Rosy’s body, clutching her and rocking back and forth.

Annabel put her arms around him. “I love you, Ewan,” she whispered. “I love you.”

He said nothing for a moment, and then his voice grated into the silence. “Oh God, I wish that you hadn’t given me that gun.”

“What?” she whispered.

“I killed Rosy with that gun,” he said. “Why did you give me the damn gun, Annabel?”