A Dangerous Damsel (The Countess Scandals)

by Kimberly Bell

  Deidre needed that ten pounds. Stealing the horse could see her executed, but it was a chance she’d had to take. The haul from the tavern plus her unexpected luck by the river should be enough to clear her brother’s debt, but Alistair wasn’t the sort of man to just let them walk away. He had plans for Deidre. She’d need more than a handful of shillings to get them safely out of his reach.

  “If I could just speak to your husband, he usually—”

  “Oh, I ken what’s usual. Ye come flouncing in here and bewitch him into giving ye a decent person’s price, when everyone kens yer a two-bit light skirt and a thief!”

  “I’ve never—”

  “Twelve shillings. Take it or don’t, but the horse stays and I suggest ye clear out of here before I call the constable.”

  Helpless fury welled inside Deidre. Being insulted was hardly a rare occurrence—women didn’t take to Deidre, especially women with husbands—but being cheated when she was so close to freedom bypassed all her carefully constructed armor. Her fingers brushed the pistol grip as she considered just taking what was owed her. If Deidre left the woman alive, the law would be after her faster than the farrier’s wife could turn up her nose. Deidre wasn’t prepared to kill anyone if she didn’t have to. The money would have to come another way.

  Deidre held out her hand. The smirk deepened as the older woman passed over the shillings. Deidre left the shop before her willpower failed completely and she gave in to the desire to smack the smug expression clear off the other woman’s face.

  She’d headed out into the night, passing a rundown pub she was all too familiar with, when real trouble found her.

  “Well, look who it is . . .”

  “The famous Lady Dee.”

  Deidre shoved her way past the two men who moved into her path. “Not now, boys. It’s been a long day.”

  “C’mon now, Dee.”

  “Come an’ have a pint wi’ us.”

  She kept walking, veering toward a well-lit street. “No time, sorry.”

  “Seems like ye ought to make a bit of time.” The men trailed after her in a lazy crisscross.

  “Alastair’s been asking for ye.”

  She suppressed the shiver that tried to run down her spine. Alastair’s thugs were barely contained attack dogs. They would turn vicious in a heartbeat if she showed fear—she’d seen it happen often enough.

  “And how would he like it if he heard I was loafing about with the likes of you, instead getting up the scratch Tris owes?” she asked, throwing a bit of flirt behind the words to keep them playful.

  “Oh, I don’t imagine he ’spects ye to get it all in one go.”

  “’Specially after today.”

  Today? What had happened today? She didn’t dare ask and give them the upper hand. “Just the same, I don’t imagine I’ll be taking your word for it.”

  They’d somehow gotten much closer. Close enough to touch her. The one they called Wick trailed a hand down her cheek. “Even if he were cross, he’d never lay a hand on Lady Dee now, would ’e?”

  “Wot’s that name ’e calls her?”

  “’Elen. ’Is ’Elen of Troy.”

  “The face that launched a thousand ships,” they said together, before breaking into a shared laugh.

  “Dunno about ships.” The second man, Teller, threw an arm over her shoulder. “But I’d wager she’s launched at least a thousand cockstands.”

  “An’ those were jus’ yers!”

  Laughter overtook them again as they amused themselves. Deidre wasn’t fooled. The hand on her upper arm gripped tight enough to leave a bruise. It was steering her away from the streetlamps.

  The bell over a bakery a few doors down chimed and a man stepped out, calling “Pleasant evening, Davey.”

  Her captors went stock-still.

  “Son of a bitch. The bollocks on this one.”

  “We’re wot, a block from the pub?”

  “Aye, that won’t do at all.”

  “Not a’ all.” The hand dropped from her arm. “Oi, MacCallum!”

  The unlucky Mr. MacCallum turned. For a moment he only saw her and smiled. Then he took notice of her companions. His parcel hit the ground as he turned and sprinted in the other direction. They took off after him without giving Deidre a second thought.

  Deidre didn’t bother waiting for her heart to stop racing. She didn’t know what the man was guilty of, but she’d seen Wick and Teller in action. He’d be lucky to survive the night. She picked up his parcel—day-old bread—and changed her route home to the complex series of switchbacks she should have chosen in the first place, if she hadn’t been so upset with the farrier’s wife.

  ***

  When Ewan rolled into town on the back of a farmer’s wagon, he was covered in midge bites and wearing a borrowed blanket for decency. His feet were blistered, his favorite horse was in the custody of some trickster wench, and yet . . . and yet. Somehow, Ewan was in a better mood than he’d been in months. Somehow, even with wood slivers from the wagon bed sneaking their way through the blanket to jab him with every bump in the road, he couldn’t stop smiling. Large black eyes, sparkling with challenge, hovered in the front of his mind. With every bump, every bite, every little inconvenience, they twinkled a little bit more and Ewan was powerless to stop the edges of his mouth from tilting up.

  The farmer thought he was a lunatic.

  “This the place then?” the farmer asked, pulling the wagon up to the inn Angus had intended to stay in for the night.

  “That’s the one.” Ewan hopped off the back of the wagon, gathering the blanket about him. “If ye’ll wait just a moment, I’ll return yer blanket and give ye something for yer trouble.”

  To say the man was skeptical would be akin to saying Ewan was “a touch underdressed,” but the farmer nodded his agreement.

  Ewan used the initial shock at his appearance and his superior size to push his way past objections and into the taproom. He was relieved to find Angus exactly where he expected him to be, enjoying a pint.

  Angus took Ewan’s arrival in with the arching of an eyebrow. “I leave ye alone for one bloody afternoon . . .”

  “Angus.”

  “Left up the stairs. End of the hall.”

  It didn’t take long to find Angus’s spare set of clothes—it was fortunate his godfather and he were the same size. Angus hadn’t brought a spare set of boots, so Ewan took the stairs back down barefoot. He caught the purse Angus tossed to him when he was back in the taproom.

  “Think ye can manage nae to lose it all before ye get to the door?”

  Ewan’s answer came in the form of an impolite gesture. He settled up with the farmer and made his way back to the taproom, tossing the purse back to Angus. “Safe and sound.”

  Angus tucked it away and looked him over. “What the devil happened to ye?”

  “I was robbed.” He helped himself to his godfather’s pint, finally washing the road dust out of his mouth.

  “Having seen more of yer hide than I’m particularly pleased about this evening, I can see yer nae injured,” Angus speculated as he waved for another drink. “Did ye nae put up a fight?”

  “I was robbed,” Ewan said, pausing for another swallow of ale. “By a lass.”

  “Ahh.” No more explanation was necessary. Angus was well aware of Ewan’s stance on harming women. “Bit unusual, a lady highwayman.”

  “That wasnae even the most unusual thing about her. She may well be the bonniest lass in Scotland.”

  Angus scoffed. “The pretty ones dinnae go in for thievery. They dinnae have to.”

  “This one does.” Ewan wondered at that. Beautiful women rarely found themselves without a willing benefactor. What would drive a woman like that to risk the road alone to make her living?

  He and Angus argued into the night, debating whether his mys
tery woman could be as attractive as he claimed or whether he might have been addled from the heat. They argued about the best way and time to arrive at Broch Murdo, and their differing opinions of the king over the water. Through it all, a pair of twinkling dark eyes hovering on the edge of his mind—along with a growing list of questions.

  ***

  Deidre closed the door to the two tiny rooms she called home and bolted the latch behind her. She leaned against it, leaving the stink of the city behind. She let the tension out of her shoulders, shaking off farriers’ wives and the ever-present threat of the constable. Her head fell back against the wood as she willed away the guilt at what she’d done to survive the day. When she was empty, when every horrid thing about her life was gone and all that remained was Deidre, she moved into the room.

  “You look old when you do that.” Tris’s voice surprised her.

  Her brother was seated at the wobbly table, with the remnants of the food that was meant to last all week spread before him. She should be angry, but it was hard to chastise him when she could see the three inches of bare wrist skin where his jacket didn’t cover. It fit when she’d given it to him at the beginning of spring. The days when he was done growing couldn’t come soon enough.

  “I can’t imagine why,” she muttered as she put the bread away. She resigned herself to making the stale loaf stretch as long as possible. “Shuk tski khalpe la royasa.”

  Tristan frowned. “What does that one mean again?”

  “Beauty cannot be eaten with a spoon,” she translated. She’d been much older than Tris when they lost their mother—and her musical Romani sayings—so she remembered more of them.

  “You make things harder than they need to be,” he said, shaking his head. “If you’d just let Alastair—”

  “No.”

  “Fine then, not Alastair, some cove with deep pockets.” He leaned back in the only chair, doing an accidental impression of their father that sent an ache straight to Deidre’s heart. “Point is, you’re not getting any younger, Dee.”

  She pushed the sentiment aside and rolled her eyes. “Perhaps when my looks have gone, you can support us.”

  Tris’s sour frown outlined exactly how distasteful he found that line of thinking. “I don’t understand why you don’t just spread your legs and snag us a fortune. It’s not like you’re a virgin.”

  She certainly wasn’t. First by force and later by choice, Deidre had given up that commodity long ago. She didn’t miss it. There was power in knowing the pleasures of a man’s body, and the pleasures of her own.

  Deidre had thought about it: finding a rich man and becoming his mistress. Maybe even making the attempt at being a wife. She thought about it often, if she was being honest, and there had been plenty of offers. Still, she never could go through with it. Many had, and Deidre wouldn’t fault them for it, but each time she considered it, she thought of the women she saw strolling on the high street. They were well fed and well kept, but their eyes . . . there was no life in their eyes. They looked empty, like menagerie animals that had been too long in a cage. The wild part of Deidre abhorred the idea.

  The wild part was always conspicuously absent the next day when the question of how they would eat arose.

  “I’m not giving my body to a man—”

  “That you can’t trust to give it back. I know.” He rolled his eyes at her, but he added that crooked smile he’d inherited from their father that reminded her of better days. ’Spose it doesn’t matter. Heard you snagged a big take tonight.”

  “And I heard it won’t be enough.” The shift in his posture told her everything she needed to know. “Damn it, Tristan. What have you done?”

  “It was just a little game, just me and some guys. Then this swell showed up talking big—I couldn’t let him strut around, not with Alastair watching. I was doing well, too, up a whole fistful, but then the luck dropped out. I dunno what happened.” His words poured out, pleading and explaining.

  Not with Alastair watching. Damn that man to hell and back a thousand times. Damn her brother for being ten kinds of fool. “You were played, Tris.”

  “Naw, it was—”

  “You were played. Alastair set you up.”

  Tris shoved out of the chair, putting space between himself and her accusations. “He wouldn’t do that.”

  He absolutely would. Deidre had seen him run that con countless times. Alistair would do that, and much worse, to keep them under his thumb.

  “He’s a vicious bastard, Tris. You can’t trust him.”

  “You trusted him.”

  She’d done more than trust him—she’d been in love with him. “I shouldn’t have.”

  Her brother’s posture remained defensive. He worshipped Alastair. It was a never-ending source of guilt for Deidre, how little effort it had taken on Alastair’s part for that to come to pass.

  “You ought to give him another chance, Dee.”

  “No.”

  “I don’t understand why you—”

  “Enough, Tris!”

  Even if she told him, Tristan wouldn’t understand. She’d run Alastair’s cons, played his seduction games—played his whore, even—with enthusiasm. Deidre made no apologies for the life she’d led and the things she’d done, but she wanted better for Tris. Alastair knew that, and he’d lured her brother into the life anyway. She would never forgive him for that.

  “Whatever you say, Lady Dee.” He lifted his chin and tightened his lips in imitation of the toughs that loitered around the pub, but the hurt showed in his too-expressive eyes as he stormed out the door.

  He would never survive in their world, wearing his feelings like that. She had to get him out.

  Chapter 3

  The first order of business was finding his horse. The rest of Ewan’s belongings would be too difficult to track, but there couldn’t be that many places willing to trade in pilfered livestock. Once he found the beast, he’d be that much closer to finding the woman who had taken them. The questions piling up in Ewan’s mind had become a nagging need to find her.

  Angus would have none of it. He claimed Ewan was using his mystery woman as an excuse to avoid the return to Broch Murdo. Ewan just considered that to be a well-timed advantage. Plenty of bold and attractive women had crossed his path but none had her lingering effect, and Ewan intended to find out why. If that meant never making it back to the place he was born, he certainly wouldn’t lose any sleep over it. Not that Ewan slept.

  Typically, he spent his evenings with a book, waiting for the dawn. He’d catch an hour or two once the sun came up before beginning his day. It had been that way for so long, he’d become accustomed to it. Last night, however, he’d spent his evening plying unsavory tavern goers with alcohol and collecting a list of places to start his search.

  The third such place had been in possession of his horse. Unwilling to be implicated in the fencing of stolen horseflesh, the farrier had agreed to return it to the inn he and Angus were staying at with little fuss. The man’s wife had also provided a wealth of information on where Ewan might find his mystery woman, which proved immediately fruitful. Halfway down an alley near an establishment suggested as one of her regular haunts was the selkie herself. She was with two men Ewan wouldn’t have trusted in broad daylight, never mind a shadowed corridor.

  “He wants to see ye, Dee.”

  She shook her head. “I can’t right now.”

  “We ain’t askin’.” They moved in on either side of her.

  “Come on now, boys.” His lady robber kept her composure, giving them a sisterly smile. “Can’t you just say you didn’t see me?”

  The two strangers shared a look.

  “If we dinnae see you . . .”

  “Then you dinnae see us.”

  The taller of the two got closer still, wrapping a lock of her hair around his finger. “Might be we cou
ld come to an agreement. Might be we have a bit of fun.”

  “And a bit of rough. As long as it dinnae come back to Alastair.”

  “How could it? We was never here.”

  Ewan had heard more than enough. Moving to the mouth of the alley, he made his presence known with a clearing of his throat. “Ye’ll want to step away from the lass.”

  ***

  It was not a good day.

  Deidre had been searching for Tris all morning. He’d never come back home after storming out and she had run out of places to look for him that weren’t near Alastair’s favorite haunt. Thoughts of her brother had taken a backseat in the face of the mess she presently found herself in. When the stranger intervened, for a moment she thought she was saved. Then she recognized him.

  “No, I dinnae think I do,” Wick told the stranger.

  Teller leered. “I’d suggest ye turn around and pretend ye never seen us, but—”

  “Ye didn’t ask nice, and now we’re cross,” Wick finished.

  Deidre shifted herself as close to the wall as she could manage in the small space afforded by the alley. She was more than happy to try her luck with the devil she didn’t know, but she doubted she’d get the chance. The smart money was always on Alastair’s boys. They weren’t known for losing fights—or leaving the kind of victims that could report them to the watch.

  The stranger seemed to gather the direction they were headed. He slipped off his coat, setting it over an abandoned crate, and started rolling up his sleeves. “Pardon my manners. Kindly step away from the lady.”

  “Ye hear that, Dee, ’e thinks yer a lady!” Wick chuckled. Neither he nor Teller took their eyes off the stranger.

  “Only thing ladylike about her is her—”

  “Yer going to want to keep yer mouth shut,” the stranger interrupted.

  “I am, am I?”

  “This one thinks he’s got the stones, does he?” Teller nudged Wick with his elbow. “Well then, if conversation’s nae yer game . . .”

  Fool. As long as they were talking, they wouldn’t be beating the ever-loving hell out of him. What did he care what they said about her anyway? She’d robbed him, for Christ’s sake. Perhaps she could slip out while they were distracted. He was very large. Maybe he’d put up enough of a fight for her to get a few streets away before they noticed she was gone.