Kate? She was supposed to be safely on her way back to London. He raced through the narrow, crowded streets, cursing himself. He should have escorted her to the coast himself. Should have guarded the ship until it sailed. Should have-- He stopped, recriminations would not help him rescue her.
How had she come to be facing a hangman’s noose? The man had called her an arsonist. He clearly recalled her horror when he set fire to the shed. What had she done? More importantly, how could he stop the proceedings?
”Pretty hair.”
Kate was horrified to hear herself extend an automatic “Thank you,” to the man who stood at her side, with a large pair of shears. He was preparing her for the hanging, shearing her hair short. She closed her eyes at the tug and pull at her scalp. She had put her faith in Bridget’s plan, since things had turned so quickly, before the duke could possibly respond.
Jamie had pleaded with her one last time to reveal her identity. Though he had conveyed Bridget’s scheme, he obviously had no belief that it was wise. “This plan is madness. It may not even work.”
He had not even been willing to share the plan until he was satisfied that she would not reveal her true identity. His doubts had come through with every detail he revealed to her in a low voice, so that the guard would not overhear. “Bridget has arranged for the rope used to hang you to be altered.”
“Will it break?” Kate imagined falling to the ground, suddenly free of the feel of the rope around her neck and swallowed reflexively. But then what?
“No.” He shook his head, a scowl etched into his still delicate features. “That would not serve any purpose, they would merely collect you from the ground and hang you again with a new rope.”
“Then what will happen?” She couldn’t imagine that the sudden green-tinged pallor of his complexion was an indication she would find the answer heartening.
He paused a moment and then said swiftly, “If it works, it will choke you, but not kill you.”
If it works. “And if it doesn’t?”
“Then you will die.” He looked away for a moment, as if he couldn’t bear to see her absorb the truth. “Bridget says it has been done before, if that is of any comfort to you.”
Since it seemed to be of no comfort to him, Kate could not stop herself from asking, “Always successfully?”
He paused before answering yet again, the greenish cast to his complexion more pronounced. “No. But when one has no other choice…” He glanced at her doubtfully, “Bridget says it will work. She says she had a vision.”
“She said she had a vision I would have a son, as well.” That had certainly not been true.
He blushed. “She was puzzled about that. Her visions still show you with a child in your arms.”
“And she saw the Daisy’s Pride lost at sea.” That was the whole reason for this mess in the first place.
He looked away. “Word is that it is missing.”
Missing. And now Bridget had seen her surviving this scheme without betraying Sean. For some reason, Kate believed her. This would work. “If she says it will work, then, it will. I will be as fortunate as the others whose necks were saved.”
“Other criminals,” he said sharply. “I don’t know if it is wise—“
Kate thought of her own helpless condition and wondered at those who had gone before her in similar circumstances. “I suppose if your people are being hanged for no good reason, one must find a way to circumvent false justice. I know I am willing to try.”
He met her eyes and grasped her hands as he leaned forward for one last plea. “Are you certain you will not change your mind? I can tell them myself. My father sailed on the Daisy’s Pride,” he faltered for a moment, letting the implication that his father might be lost at sea hang between them, and then continued bravely, “But his reputation is well known here. I shall be believed.”
Kate was tempted, for just a moment. “I cannot.” She would trust to Bridget. Would trust to the ingenuity of a desperate populace that had faced oppression for centuries and found ways to circumvent some of the worst of the uneven justice.
“Very well. Then we shall have to give Bridget’s plan a try.”
“It will work.” She spoke to console him more than herself. She believed her words, but they offered no comfort. What did she have to live for? She had no child, no hope of a child, and her husband did not want her.
“I will tell Bridget that you agree to this method of escape.”
She laughed at the idea. “What does my agreement matter? I will be dangling unconscious from the rope until I strangle to death, or I am rescued. I have no part to play in this.”
He looked toward the door where the guard stood. “Still, there is a risk for those who will attempt to help you. They need to know you will not betray them.”
Kate glanced around her cell and said with absolutely certainty. “I will not say or do anything that would put anyone else here.”
She watched him leave with a sense of unreality. Would she ever see him again? Would Bridget’s mad plan work for her, as it had for others? And if it did, what would she do once she had her life back in her own hands?
She closed her eyes, refusing to cry, not even when they came to lead her away to her own hanging.
She saw Jamie again when she stood on the scaffold in the sunshine. At first, the jeering crowd below her was a sea of unfriendly faces, but then she saw him, white faced, clutching tightly to Bridget, who seemed serenely confident that things would go well.
Kate tried not to flinch when the rope was fitted around her head to lay heavy and limp around her neck. She could see no difference between this rope and any other she had ever seen. Had they chosen the right rope?
She said a quick prayer of hope that all went well. At least, she told herself, if she did hang, it would be as Mary Duffy. No one would connect her to Sean. And he would never know. She had made Jamie promise not to tell him. He assured her Bridget had made a similar promise.
A disturbance in the crowd distracted her from the last movements of the hangman and she welcomed it. Until she saw the man who was bearing through the crowd like a maddened bull. It was Sean.
“Don’t—“ she tried to tell him as she fell, all words choked from her as she slowly began to strangle in front of his eyes. Don’t tell anyone who I am she screamed soundlessly until darkness closed around her.
Sean beat his way through the crowd, his eyes fixed on Kate’s slender figure. Surely he could reach her in time.
She saw him, he thought. There was a spark of awareness in her eyes, and he swore she had been about to speak to him, just as she fell.
With a roar, he tried to reach her dangling body, but the crowd held him back and they cheered and danced and tossed him aside.
As the next prisoner was led up to the scaffold, and Kate’s body was unceremoniously cut down and carted away, he turned his direction in the crowd, to follow the cart to the place where it dumped its precious burden on the ground as if she were a sack of potatoes. Perhaps not even with that much care.
He was too late. He could see that from a distance, but he refused to accept what his eyes told him. She lay cold and blue on the ground. “Kate. Katie. Oh my Kate. What have I done to you?”
“Sean, do you want to get her killed with your foolishness?” Bridget appeared beside him, cloaked, her face hidden from his sight. “Let me do this.”
He stood back, astounded, as she moved forward, wailing. A guard came to question her suspiciously, but she claimed to be Mary Duffy’s sister and within moments, she had laid claim to the body.
“You there!” Bridget turned, her cloak falling back to reveal the glow in her green eyes. “Come help me carry my sister’s body away from here.”
Sean came, numbly, lifting Kate’s slight weight in his arms. She rested limply against him, a dead weight. Dead. She was still warm, though. If he had been just a little earlier, he castigated himself and then stopped. No. If he hadn’t tried so hard to push her ou
t of his life, she’d still be alive.
An urgent whisper sounded behind him. “Take her away now, my lord, unless you truly wish to see her hanged.”
He turned to see Jamie Jeffreys. Sean looked into the blue eyes of his enemy’s son and saw no arrogant malice or trickery, only grave concern and jittery tension. “Did you do this?”
“Tell Bridget I have paid my debt and owe her nothing--not even children.” With that, the boy turned and strode away stiff backed as any proud Sassenach.
Sean wondered if the two had married. But he didn’t have the desire to know. Not now. He followed Bridget away from the scene, ignoring the cheers of the crowd as another man swung.
Bridget stopped at a neat blue door and knocked three times, then once. The door opened just wide enough for Sean to pass with Kate in his arms and then shut quickly. The sound of a bolt being shot home was loud in the darkness. And then a candle was lit.
“Quickly, there is no time,” the strange woman said. “Put her down here.” She used the candle to indicate a pallet on the floor.
“I will not.” Sean protested. He would not let her go. Not yet. The rituals would have to be performed, he knew that. But not yet. Not here.
“Sean—you will ruin everything.” Bridget said. “Give Kate to this woman if you want her to live.”
Live? A sudden suspicion gave him hope and he did as the woman bid. But once Kate lay on the pallet, he pushed aside the stranger and tried to rouse Kate himself. He rubbed at her cheeks, startled when her bluish color gave way to a pinker hue.
For long moments, nothing happened and he began to believe that the pink color was an illusion of hope. But then she began to cough and struggle for breath. In a moment her eyes opened, blue and clear.
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
Kate felt the panic subside as she realized she could breathe again. Realized that the shadowy figure kneeing above her was her husband. Sean had come. But how? She sat up, pushing his hands away while she rubbed at her aching neck. “What are you doing here?”
He blinked, as if he could not quite believe she would dare chastise him mere seconds after her near death. “Rescuing you.”
“I didn’t call him.” Bridget stepped forward into the circle of candlelight. “I promise you. Maybe Jamie—“
“Neither of you had the good sense to call me,” Sean said angrily. “I found out from an innkeeper who witnessed your arrest. Why did you not send for me?”
“Why should I have called upon you?” She wouldn’t let him treat her as if she were the one at fault. He was the one who had discarded her.
“So that I could rescue you, of course.” The vibration she felt from his tense body warned her that he was on the edge of losing his temper, but she could not bring herself to care. Nearly dying was an exhausting business.
“I thought you might be grateful to be a widower, rather than have to go through the inconvenience of a divorce.” She didn’t bother to strain the bitterness from her tone.
He answered her bitterness with his own. “I assure you, I had no desire to be a widower—and I was never surer of it when I saw you dangling there at the end of the rope.”
“I’m sorry, Sean. I know I’ve been nothing but trouble to you.” She wanted him to gather her up in his arms, to profess his mistake in sending her away, but he showed no signs of doing so. She tried to stand, but her limbs were too shaky to support her.
He reached out to steady her with a warm, strong arm. “Trouble. You have been that.”
Bridget said sharply, “She was willing to keep your secrets, Sean. And to protect me.”
Before Kate could protest, Bridget had poured out the whole story to her brother.
Sean turned to her. “You lied about who you were so that I wouldn’t be at risk?” He didn’t seem at all touched or pleased by her sacrifice.
“I promised I wouldn’t betray you. I keep my promises.”
She thought there would have been less pain in his eyes if she’d run him through with her sword six times over. “And I don’t, now, do I?”
She wouldn’t give him any quarter. She thought she deserved a little thanks for what she had been willing to do for him. “Not to me you don’t.” She couldn’t help the temper that flared inside. “You didn’t even manage to father a child—which would have given the duke time to come and rescue me.”
“So I heard from the innkeeper, please forgive me for—“ His sharp tone cut off mid-sentence and she found herself suddenly crushed against his chest.
“Forgive me.” His voice was soft and hushed against her ear and he cradled her gently as a child. “I’ve been a stubborn fool. I should have been the one swinging this morning for I’ve done to you.”
“I hardly think your crimes were worthy of hanging.” Kate argued, thinking of the horrible sensation of choking misery she had endured. “Fifty years of marriage and ten children would have been just enough punishment.”
“Is that the sentence you think I deserve for treating you as I have?”
She didn’t want to answer that question. Especially not now, with him so close to her. “No one deserves to be hanged for any crime short of murder.” She pushed him away with a sigh and swallowed hard, rubbing at her neck. “I suppose I’m lucky the rope didn’t break.”
“Not luck,” Bridget interjected. “Someone made certain that there would be just enough give to keep you alive, but not enough that you would fail to lose consciousness and appear dead. Apparently, it’s a time worn trick, practiced since Cromwell’s time and possibly even before.”
Sean gathered her into his arms again. “Trick or not, I’m grateful. I didn’t think I’d ever see you again. But I wanted to imagine you in London, not food for the worms.”
She grimaced. “I’m afraid that humor does not sit well with me, seeing how close to truth it nearly was. All I want to do is go back home.”
She felt his muscles tense briefly as he held her. “Will you be wanting to go back to London then?”
“As soon as I’ve seen to Bridget. I don’t care if you’re divorcing me, I want you to let Bridget come to live with me so that I can get her the help she needs.”
“I don’t need any help,” Bridget protested in surprise at being dragged into their conversation.
He ignored his sister and nodded to Kate. “I knew she had done something, but I never guessed she’d be so reckless.”
He loved her, she knew that. But he had not been able to heal her. She didn’t know if she could, but she was determined to try. The girl had saved her life, after all. “It’s time to do something about her, Sean.”
His grip tightened on her arms. “I’ll not put her in a madhouse.”
She shook her head fiercely. “Of course not. I want to take her to London with me.”
“London! Absolutely not. She’d go completely mad surrounded by men like the ones who hurt her.”
“My sisters are hardly burly men.” Kate wondered what he thought her life had been like for the last five years. Niall, the duke, and her brothers-in-law were the only men she associated with in any fashion at all.
“She is not suited for such a life.”
“How can you know that? She had never had a chance for such a life.” She put all her conviction into her words. He might not want her for wife, but surely he wanted the best for his sister. “I want to bring her where she can have the society of ladies. Those who will allow her to be herself while she faces what must be faced.”
“I cannot allow that.” She could see him struggling with the idea of his sister far away from him. Though she sympathized, she knew he could not give his sister what she needed.
“So you will allow her to accompany you in your illegal activities then? She is quite good at setting fires, you know?” She didn’t bother to hide her contempt, although her voice rasped rather than cut.
“I will not allow—“
“She cannot go on this way. If you do not trust me to take her with me, come with us.” Her
heart stopped at the unexpected invitation. She had not meant to issue it. Had not wanted to see him back away from her as if she were diseased.
“I cannot leave here—“
She interrupted, not wanting to hear the litany of excuses. “Why not? Two weeks will not change things here. Even two months is not unreasonable. That way you can see for yourself if she takes to the change well or not.” Painfully, she reminded him, “You will not have to rely on letters from me that might only be sweet lies meant to placate you and make you think things are not horrible.”
He had the grace to flush. “My words were not lies--”
“They were not the truth, either. I deserved the truth and so do you. Come with us to London.”
“I am needed here.”
“True enough. Let me take Bridget and begin to work with her. You may come when you are able, more than once if you like. I have paid you enough that you can afford several passages back and forth without denting the sum.”
His eyes darkened. “I--”
“It does not matter what either of you say. I will not go.” There was no doubt in Bridget’s voice.
“Do it for Jamie if you will not do it for yourself.” Kate said quietly. She was not blind to Jamie’s love for Bridget, but she did not know if the girl cared for him as much.
“What has he to do with it?” Sean spoke quickly, hotly.
“He helped her rescue me. And his conscience would at last be at ease if he knew she had a future once again, as she did five years ago.”
Bridget seemed angry at the suggestion that Jamie would care for her. “He’s off to distant lands to gain his own glory, why does he need to worry for me? I have a future here. I will not go. I cannot leave the fairies.”
There was a long moment of silence. “You will go.” Sean’s voice was implacable. For a moment Kate could believe the idea had been his in the first place.
Kate sighed, not willing to sit by as a battle brewed between brother and sister. “I wish to introduce you to my family, Bridget. You are not going forever. Just for a trip. I thought you said you wished to travel.”
A Very Romantic Christmas Page 40
