Giving and taking and striving for more.
Possessing, then surrendering.
She had a saying she was fond of, that actions always spoke louder than mere words. If he’d doubted the veracity of that claim, she would have convinced him that night.
She took him in with a joy that eclipsed all he’d ever known, embraced him and gave him more than he could fathom.
She was his all, his everything, then and evermore.
Emily could imagine no greater joy than when she shattered beneath him and, looking up through awestruck, love-struck eyes, saw his face in that instant when he lost himself in her.
Saw all he’d until then tried to shield.
Saw vulnerability acknowledged, accepted, and held close.
Saw love and abject devotion in his eyes.
Finally saw him, all he was, clearly—her warrior with an unshielded heart.
They slumped together, arms tight, possessive even in aftermath, waiting for their thundering hearts to slow, waiting for reality to reclaim them.
When he finally eased from her arms, withdrew from her and slumped on his stomach beside her, she was already planning. “We’ll wait here.” Turning her head, she caught his eye. “I’m happy to wait here until the other two—Monteith and Carstairs—arrive. Until they’re safe.” Sliding around, down into the bed beside him, she raised a hand and traced one heavy shoulder. “You won’t be able to concentrate on our future until then—and in truth, neither will I.”
The one eye she could see held hers, then he humphed and turned his head fully her way. “They’ll be here soon. Logan tomorrow, and although Royce has said nothing about when Rafe is due, I’m sure it’ll be no more than two days.”
She smiled, a slow smile of anticipation. “Good.”
She continued to smile, but her gaze grew distant. Her hand continued to stroke Gareth’s bare shoulder. After a minute had ticked by, curious, he asked, “What are you thinking of?”
She refocused on him, and her smile deepened. “I was just thinking: If only my family could see me now.”
He looked at her in mock horror, then lifted his head and dropped it back into the pillow. “Thank God they can’t.”
“You do understand that he had to die, don’t you?” In the drawing room of the house they’d made their headquarters in Bury St. Edmunds, Alex topped up Daniel’s glass from the decanter of fine brandy Roderick had liberated from the locked sideboard.
How very apt, Daniel thought, as he took a healthy swallow. As usual, Alex was abstemious, but tonight he was also sipping from a glass.
“Poor Roderick.” With a shake of the head, Alex replaced the decanter on the sideboard. “So…sadly ineffectual.”
“Indeed.” Daniel took another swallow. He was still a trifle shocked—not by Roderick’s death itself—that had, he suspected, been coming for some time; it was his idiot half brother’s lack of thought for consequences that had landed the three of them in this mire after all. Still, he hadn’t seen it coming—hadn’t seen Death in Alex’s eyes until the dagger had slid home.
But Alex had been right. Roderick had had to die, then and there, in that moment. Thanks to Alex’s quick thinking, the pair of them had got clean away.
Daniel raised his glass, locked eyes with Alex, now seated on the sofa nearby. “To Roderick—the idiot—who was convinced to the last that our sire would always save him. He was a fool, but he was our brother.” He drank.
Alex sipped. “Half brother.” Alex’s lips curved. “Sadly, he missed the better half—the cleverer half.”
Daniel tipped his glass in acknowledgment, but said nothing. He and Alex shared a father, but their mothers had been different, so the cleverer half Alex alluded to he had missed as well. He looked at his glass, and decided he’d better stop drinking.
“But Roderick no longer matters, my dear. We do.” Alex’s voice was low but clear, as always compelling. “And we need to take steps to ensure our necks remain free of the hangman’s noose.”
“Indubitably.” Setting down his glass, Daniel met Alex’s eyes. “As ever, I’m yours to command, but I suspect I’d better go and check on Monteith. We need his copy of the letter.”
Alex nodded. “While you’re doing that, I’ll organize another move. Sadly, here, we’re too close to where Roderick met his end. Our opponents might think to search. I’ll have somewhere else organized—not too far away—by the time you get back with Monteith’s letter.”
“And then we’ll need to get a welcome in place for Carstairs.”
“Indeed.” Alex’s eyes glittered. “I’ll start work on that tomorrow, too. Now we know he’s coming down the Rhine, and at speed, then it’s all but certain he’ll pass through Rotterdam. I’ve already sent orders to all those on the other side of the Channel to ensure he runs into a very warm reception. But given that the other three have all come this way, what are the odds, do you think, that he’s making for either Felix-stowe or Harwich? They are, after all, the closest and most convenient ports to this part of the country.”
“He’ll be carrying the original, won’t he?”
Alex nodded. “Just the fact he’s coming in on the most direct route…our puppetmaster isn’t trying to draw out cultists with him, but to give him the shortest and safest road, the best possible chance of reaching the puppetmaster. That’s why he’s the last, and also why Monteith is coming in from the opposite direction.”
“So Carstairs won’t be long.”
“No, but what I have planned in Rotterdam will at least slow him down, which is all we need.” Alex looked at Daniel. “You take care of Monteith, and leave me to put our welcome for Carstairs in place. By the time you get back with Monteith’s letter, all will be set.” Alex smiled, viciously intent. “Whoever our puppetmaster is, I guarantee Carstairs will never reach him.”
Daniel nodded and stood. “I’d better get going if I’m to join the men tonight.”
“Where exactly are they?”
“In a deserted barn outside a village called Eynesbury. I left them with strict orders to keep watch for Monteith and make sure he doesn’t reach Cambridge. They’ll know where he’s spending the night.” Daniel smiled, envisioning carnage. “I believe I’ll pay Major Monteith a midnight visit.”
Alex understood what he was planning. “Very good. And who knows what possibilities tomorrow might bring? Take care, my dear—I’ll see you later tomorrow, once you have Monteith’s copy.”
Daniel saluted. “Until then.”
He turned away and strode for the door, and so didn’t see the way Alex watched him.
Didn’t feel the cold, piercing weight of those ice-blue eyes.
After he’d passed through the open doorway and disappeared, Alex sat staring at the vacant space.
Debating.
Several minutes ticked past.
Then Alex turned and looked toward the doorway at the far end of the room. “M’wallah!”
When the fanatical head of Alex’s personal guard appeared, Alex coldly said, “Have someone saddle my horse, and lay out my riding breeches, jacket, and my heavy cloak. I expect to be out all night.”
The Brazen Bride
STEPHANIE
LAURENS
The
Brazen
Bride
THE BLACK COBRA QUARTET
He was startlingly,
heartbreakingly,
breathtakingly beautiful.
His face, all clean, angular lines and sculpted planes, embodied the very essence of masculine beauty—there was not a soft note anywhere. Combined with the muscled hardness of his body, that face promised virility, passion—and direct, unadorned, unadulterated sin.
Such a face did not belong to a man given to sweetness but to action, command, and demand.
Chiseled lips, firm and fine, sent a seductive shiver down her spine. The line of his jaw made her fingertips throb. He had winged black brows, a wide forehead, and lashes so black and thick and long she was instantly
jealous.
As usual her instincts had been right. This man was—would be—dangerous. To her peace of mind, if nothing else.
Men like this—who looked like he did, who had bodies like his—led women into sin.
And into stupidity.
One
December 10, 1822
One o’clock in the morning
On the deck of the Heloise Leger, the English Channel
Hell hath no greater fury than the cataclysmic storms that raked the English Channel in winter. With elemental tempest raging about him, Major Logan Monteith leapt back from the slashing blade of a Black Cobra cult assassin. Raising his saber to counter the second assassin’s strike, using his dirk, clutched in his left fist, to fend off the first attacker’s probing knife, Logan suspected he’d be learning about the afterlife all too soon.
Winds howled; waves crashed. Water sluiced across the deck in a hissing spate.
The night was blacker than Hades, the driving rain a blurring veil. Falling back a step, Logan swiped water from his eyes.
As one, the assassins surged, beating him back toward the prow. Blades met, steel ringing on steel, sparks flaring, pinpricks of brightness in the engulfing dark. Abruptly, the deck canted—all three combatants desperately fought for balance.
The ship, a Portuguese merchantman bound for Portsmouth, was in trouble. Logan had been forced to join its crew five days before, when, on reaching Lisbon, he’d discovered the town crawling with cultists. Battered by pounding waves, buffetted and tossed on the storm-wracked sea, as the deck leveled, the ship wallowed and swung, no longer held into the wind. Whether the rudder had broken or the captain had abandoned the wheel, Logan couldn’t tell. He couldn’t spare the time to squint through the rain-drenched dark at the bridge.
Instinct and experience kept his eyes locked on the men facing him. There’d been a third, but Logan had accounted for him in the first rush. The body was gone, claimed by the ravening waves.
Saber swinging, Logan struck, but immediately was forced to block and counter, then retreat yet another step into the narrowing prow. Further confining his movements, reducing his options. Didn’t matter; two against one in the icy, pelting rain, with his grips on his dirk and his saber cramping, leather-soled boots slipping and sliding—the assassins were barefoot, giving them even that advantage—he couldn’t effectively go on the offensive.
He wasn’t going to survive.
As he met and deflected another vicious blow, he acknowledged that, yet even as he did his innate stubbornness rose. He’d been a cavalry officer for more than a decade, fought in wars over half the globe, been through hell more than once, and survived.
He’d faced assassins before, and lived.
Miracles happened.
He told himself that even as, teeth gritted, he angled his saber up to block a slash at his head—and his feet went from under him, pitching him back against the railing.
The wooden scroll-holder strapped to his back slammed into his spine.
From the corner of his eye, he saw white teeth flash in a dark face—a feral grin as the second assassin swung and slashed. Logan hissed as the blade sliced down his left side, cutting through coat and shirt into muscle, grazing bone, before angling across his stomach to disembowel him. Instinct had him flattening against the railing; the blade cut, but not deep enough.
Not that that would save him.
Lightning cracked, a jagged tear of brilliant white splitting the black sky. In the instant’s illumination, Logan saw the two assassins, dark eyes fanatically gleaming, triumph in their faces, gather themselves to spring and bring him down.
He was bleeding, badly.
He saw Death, felt it—tasted ashes as icy fingers pierced his body, reaching for his soul.
He dragged in a last gasp, braced himself. Given his mission, given his occupation for the last several years, Saint Peter ought at least consider letting him into Heaven.
A long-forgotten prayer formed on his lips.
The assassins sprang.
Crack!!
Impact—sudden, sharp, catastrophic—flung him and the assassins overboard. The plunge into turbulent depths, into the churning fury of the sea, separated them.
Tumbling in the icy dark, instinct took hold; righting himself, Logan struck upward. His dirk was still in his left fist; he’d released his saber, but it was tied to his belt by its lanyard—he felt the reassuring tap of the hilt against his leg.
He was a strong swimmer. The assassins almost certainly weren’t—it would be a wonder if they could swim at all. Dismissing them—he had more pressing concerns—he broke the surface and hauled in a huge breath. He shook his head, then peered through the water weighing down his lashes.
The storm was at its height, the seas mountainous. He couldn’t see beyond the next towering wave, while with elemental rage the wind whipped and strafed, shrieking worse than a thousand banshees.
The ship had been in open water in the middle of the Channel when the storm had hit, but he had no idea how far, the tempest had tossed them, nor any clear idea of direction. No idea if land was close, or …
He’d been losing blood when he’d hit the water. How long he would last in the cauldron of icy waves, how soon his already depleted strength would fail—
His hand struck something—wood, a plank. No, even better, a section of planking. Desperate, Logan grabbed it, grimly hung on as the next wave tried to slap him away, then, gritting his teeth, he hauled himself up and onto the makeshift raft.
The cold had numbed his flesh, yet the cut down his side sent burning pain lancing through his entire body.
For a long moment, he lay prone on the planks, gasping, then, gathering his ebbing strength, steeling himself, he inched and edged further onto the planks until he could lock his right hand over the ragged front edge. His feet still dangled in the water, but his body was supported to his knees; it was the best he could do.
The waves surged. His raft pitched, but rode the swell.
Beneath the lashing roar of the storm, waves crashed. Cheek to the wet wood, he listened, concentrating, and confirmed that the waves were smashing against something nearby.
The ship was, he thought, wallowing in the unrelieved blackness to his right. Breaking up. Sinking. Given how he and the assassins had been flung, the impact must have been midship. Whipping up his failing strength, he lifted his head, searched, saw debris but no bodies—no other survivors—but only he and the assassins had been so far forward in the prow.
Lightning cracked again, and showed him the ship’s bare masts silhouetted against the inky sky.
As the simultaneous clap of thunder faded, he heard a sucking, rushing sound. Recognizing the portent, he peered at the ship.
The listing, tipping, capsizing ship.
Out of the night, the main mast came swinging down.…
He didn’t even have time to swear before the top of the mast thumped down across him and the world went black.
“Linnet! Linnet! Come quickly! Come see!”
Linnet Trevission looked up from the old flagstones of the path that ran from the stable to the kitchen door. She’d left the stable and was nearing the kichen garden; directly ahead, the solid bulk of her home, Mon Coeur, sat snug and serene, anchored within the protective embrace of stands of elm and fir bent and twisted into outlandish shapes by the incessant sea winds.
At present, however, in the aftermath of the storm that had raged for half the night, the winds were mild, coyly coquettish, the winter sun casting a honey glow over the house’s pale stone.
“Linnet! Linnet!”
She smiled as Chester, one of her wards—a tow-headed scamp of just seven—came pelting around the side of the house, heading for the back door. “Chester! I’m here.”
The boy looked up, then veered onto the stable path.
“You have to come!” Skidding to a halt, he grabbed her hand and tugged. “There’s been a wreck!” His face alight, excitement and tension str
aining his voice, he looked up into her eyes. “There are bodies! And Will says one of the men is alive! You have to come!”
Linnet’s smile fell from her face. “Yes, of course.” Swiping up her skirts—wishing she’d worn her breeches instead—she strode quickly toward the back door, inwardly reviewing the necessary tasks, tasks she’d dealt with often before.
On the southwest tip of Guernsey, dealing with shipwrecks was an inescapable part of life.
Chester trotted at her side, his hand gripping hers—too tightly, but then his father had been lost at sea three years ago. As they neared the kitchen door, it opened to reveal Linnet’s aunt, Muriel.
“Did I hear aright? A wreck?”
Linnet nodded. “Will sent Chester—there’s at least one, survivor. I’ll go straightaway—can you find Edgar and the others? Tell them to bring the old gate, and the pack of bandages and splints.”
“Yes, of course. But where?”
Linnet looked at Chester. “Which cove?”
“West one.”
Grimacing, Linnet met Muriel’s eyes. Of course it would be that one—the rockiest and most dangerous. Especially for whoever had been washed up. “Broken bones, almost certainly.”
Nodding briskly, Muriel waved her off. “Go. I’ll have everything ready here when you get back.”
Linnet met Chester’s eyes. “Let’s race.”
Chester flashed a grin, let go of her hand, turned and ran back around the house.
Both hands now free, Linnet gathered her skirts and set out in pursuit; with her longer legs, she was soon on Chester’s heels. The path cut through the surrounding trees, then out across the rocky expanse that bordered the edge of the low cliffs.
“Hold up!” Linnet called as they rounded the southern headland of the long northwestern side of the island and the west cove opened up below them.
Chester halted at the top of the path—little more than a goat track—that led down to a strip of coarse sand. Beyond the sand lay rocks, exposed now that the tide was mostly out, a tumbled jumble of granite from fist-sized to small boulders that formed the floor of the cove. The cove wasn’t all that wide; two promontories of larger, jagged rocks enclosed it, marching out into the lashing gray waves.
The Untamed Bride Plus Two Full Novels and Bonus Material Page 77
