The Wolf Duke

by K. J. Jackson

  He picked up her left wrist. The cream kidskin glove she wore stretched up past her elbow. She wore no glove on her right hand.

  Still balancing on his heels, he looked up at Lawrence. “What did you find with her?”

  “Just this jacket—her other glove was wrapped with it, though it’s much shorter.” Lawrence held up a bundle of items. “And this dagger from a sheath at her calf and her reticule strapped about her waist.”

  Reiner motioned for them. Lawrence handed him the items. He set the jacket on the ground, first looking inside the reticule. Coins, nothing else. He set it onto her jacket.

  The knife he flipped around in his hand. Not ordinary. He ran the blade across his thumb. Honed sharp. The handle caught a shard of light from the moon, gold flashing. He squinted in the darkness. The smooth onyx handle was inlaid with strands of gold—a vine weaving, climbing toward the hilt.

  This woman was no ordinary thief. She was of money, if nothing else. Her clothes, her coin, the smell of citrus and lavender lifting from her hair. Possibly even of a titled family.

  But what would she be doing attempting to sneak into his home? On a vine of all things.

  A shot of rage ran down his spine.

  Lord Falsted.

  The man would stoop to send just such a woman after him. After his secrets.

  “Bring her to the Rose room.”

  “But, your grace, that is far too close to your chambers,” Colton said. “There is still a room in the south wing available.”

  “I’ll not have a possibly hazardous unknown locked into a room near the rest of our guests. Not until I know who she is and what she came here for.”

  “I can set her in the cellars.”

  “That is assuming she is here to do harm, Colton. We don’t know what her business is here. She comes from money, judging by her dress. And if she is an innocent and connected to one of my guests—possibly injured or left for dead here, then I’ll not have her waking in the cold dank of the undercrofts.”

  “But, your grace—”

  “I can lock the door on the Rose room. We can lock the shutters.” Reiner stood, looking at Colton. “She’ll not escape the room if her intentions here are as we suspect.”

  Colton nodded. “As you wish, your grace.” He motioned for Lawrence to pick up the woman.

  Reiner turned, walking back the way he came.

  He had a party to get back to.

  { Chapter 2 }

  Reiner held the cup of water in his right hand, staring down at the young woman lying in the middle of the tester bed in the Rose room.

  The night and day had come and gone and she hadn’t roused. There hadn’t been even a flutter of her lashes, but her breathing had remained steady.

  His anger had not.

  If this was what he suspected—and likely he was correct—that she’d been sent by Lord Falsted, then he planned to drag every modicum of information about who she was and what she was sent to do from her.

  No matter what it took.

  Her horse had been found just beyond the tree line this morning. The fine creature and the saddle just gave evidence to the fact that she had wealth behind her. Whose wealth was the current mystery. Not one of his guests made any mention that they were expecting a young woman to join them, nor did any act particularly guilty—as if they had just attacked an innocent woman and dumped her body behind the castle.

  It would be exactly like Falsted to send a woman such as this to him to ruin him. The man’s suspicions of Reiner knew no bounds. To his face, Falsted was nothing but congenial and accommodating. But Reiner knew the depths of the man’s distrust.

  In the dwindling evening rays of daylight streaming in through the slats of the locked shutters across the windows, he could see the woman’s features plainly.

  Blond hair with a slight curl to it. Rogue red strands weaved in with the deep honey color. Her bone structure delicate, her straight, perfectly proportioned nose tipped up a notch at the end, lending impishness to her face. Dark lashes fell long against her smooth white skin while her high cheekbones lent an air of grace to her face. Her flawless complexion was interrupted only by a feathery dusting of freckles across the bridge of her nose and the rather large bruised lump just above her left temple.

  His look travelled down the length of her. Not short, not tall, she was proportioned well with nice curves along her svelte body. His gaze paused at the creamy skin rising above the bodice of her dress. Her breasts were tight against the dark fabric, rising up from her ribcage, perfect mounds to cup.

  A beauty from head to toe.

  Some bastard knew what he liked. Reiner had plenty of enemies—Falsted was just the most disgruntled at the moment. So he just had to find out which one of his enemies this chit worked for. How dangerous she was. He knew plenty of people would like to see him ruined—or dead.

  Taking a long moment, his attention went down to his wrist and he folded back the fabric of his white lawn shirt to his mid-forearm. With the majority of his guests gone, he’d foregone his coat, opting for just a shirt and waistcoat for this confrontation. Changing the cup of water to his left hand, he repeated the process with his other sleeve. His fingers tightening around the glass, he stepped closer to her on the bed.

  Without pause, he tossed the water into her face.

  She jerked, curling onto her side in the bed, but didn’t rouse.

  At least she was moving.

  Reiner went to the basin of water atop the chest of drawers and dipped the cup into it, filling the glass. He moved back to the bed, splashing the water full onto her face.

  A brutal gasp and she sputtered, jolting upright in the bed, her arms flailing. Wiping the water from her lashes, she frantically looked around.

  No sense of time or place in her eyes.

  Her look landed on him.

  Stark terror shot through her eyes. Blue eyes. Light blue eyes with the oddest rogue streak of golden amber that burst upward in her left iris. That one flaw in the unique color, as though Leonardo had mixed the color of her eyes from the seas, but then a speckle of gold paint had fallen into the creation.

  Her head swung to the left side, searching. Searching. She gasped, pausing for a second as she saw the side table.

  He’d set her dagger there on purpose, curious to see what she would do with it.

  He didn’t have to wait long.

  In the next instant, her legs swung out from the bed and she popped onto her feet, snatching the knife and scurrying to the far corner of the room. A practiced hand, she held the onyx-handled blade deftly with seasoned grace.

  One question answered.

  She wasn’t some innocent maiden dumped behind his castle.

  Dagger high and pointed at him, she moved backward until she ran into the wall. Her gloved left hand flattened on the plaster for support as she eyed him. “Who are you?”

  “Who am I?” Reiner turned from her, walking over to the chest of drawers to set the cup atop. He looked at her over his shoulder. “No I think the question is ‘who are you?’”

  Her head shook slightly. “No you—where am I and how did I get in here?”

  Interesting—a Scottish lilt lined her words. He hadn’t expected that. Reiner faced her fully, his arms crossing over his chest. “What were you doing trying to sneak into my home?”

  She flicked the knife in the air. “I don’t have a blasted idea where I am, sir, so I most certainly did not attempt to sneak into your home.”

  His eyebrow cocked. “No?”

  “No.” She shoved off from the wall, approaching him, the tip of the dagger high at his chest. “Now tell me where in the hell I am.”

  He didn’t flinch. “You would like to play a game, then? Fine. You are at Wolfbridge Castle.”

  “Wolf…” Her look narrowed at him, confusion flickering across her eyes. “Wolfbridge…”

  “Castle.”

  “What—where?” She shook her head and took another step toward him, the dagger within
striking distance. “How did you get me here?”

  “What’s your name?”

  She flicked the blade back and forth in the air. “Tell me how in the bloody hell you got me here.”

  “Tell me your name and I’ll answer your question.”

  She paused for a moment, her lips pulling back tight. “Sloane.” The word seethed from her mouth.

  He offered a quick nod. “Sloane it is. I am Reiner. And I didn’t get you anywhere. You got yourself to my grounds and I merely had the lump of you picked up from the dirt and set in here. But I’m pretty well convinced you already know that fact.”

  Confusion sank her gaze to slits, deep lines etching out from the edges of her eyes.

  Reiner had to give her credit—she played it well, an actress of the highest order.

  She gasped a deep breath, the air shaky into her lungs. “No. Impossible. I—I don’t ken a Wolf—what is it?”

  “Wolfbridge.”

  “No.” Her look went hard. “No. I don’t ken a Wolfbridge Castle.” She flicked the blade higher. “Now let us try the truth, sir. Who are you?”

  “I’m not the one telling lies, Sloane, if that is your true name.” His left arm flicked up from the clamp across his chest and his finger circled around the room. “And you will be my guest—locked in here, of course, until you can remember who you are and what you planned to do once you broke into my home.”

  Her gaze flew about the room, pausing on one of the locked shutters across the windows. Her look travelled to each shutter. Two. Three. Four. All locked. Her head swiveled to the door. Closed.

  Without warning, she lunged at him, dagger swiping wide. Reiner jumped a step backward just out of her reach.

  A gargled squeak choked through her throat and her chest heaved in panic—in anger. His gaze dipped down.

  Damn, the water had seeped onto the front of her dress, soaking it and turning the dark fabric almost transparent. Thin stays and an even thinner chemise matted to the fabric, leaving nothing to the imagination.

  “What?” Her face scrunched in confusion for a second and then she followed his gaze, looking down.

  Her stare flung up. “You bloody heathen.” She lurched forward with the dagger high, swinging for him.

  Reiner side-stepped her, dodging the flashing blade. He kept moving, forcing her to circle him. Swipe after swipe through the air, but she couldn’t come close enough to nick skin.

  They rounded each other four times.

  “My brothers.” Her voice screeched, the dagger swiping. “My brothers will come for you—they’ll come for you with the force of a hundred men raging for blood.”

  “I doubt it.” He dodged to the right, then stepped toward her and snatched her flailing wrist in midair.

  She screamed and he twisted her back toward the bed, cracking the bones of her forearm across the left bottom bedpost. The dagger clattered to the wood floor.

  He leaned in, his breath fuming as he set his face directly before hers. “Tell me who you work for.”

  Their eyes locked. For all his oversized menacing, she stared up at him with just as much raging defiance.

  Five minutes with her and he’d lost his temper.

  He never lost his temper.

  The one tenet of his life. Always in control. Cold and in control.

  He stood straight, tossing her wrist to the side, and bent to pick up the dagger. It had served its purpose.

  Quick—a ghost wisping past him—she ran for the fireplace and picked up the iron poker.

  Spinning fast, she swung it out. Swung it hard, the air whooshing around the metal.

  She twisted on her feet, losing her balance and stumbling to the side. “My head.” Her left hand went up, gripping at the lump at her temple. “Oh—hell—it hurts—it—” She fumbled another step to the left. “What—what did you do—it—”

  She swayed in a wide circle, her face blanching white.

  The fire poker fell from her hand, her eyelids flickering.

  She dropped, collapsing straight down, her body crumpling onto itself.

  Reiner stood, his breath still seething, staring at her inert form on the floor for a long minute. Waiting for her to move.

  Surely she was playing at a ruse.

  Another minute.

  He set her dagger onto the top of the chest of drawers, far out of her reach, then approached her, kicking the fire poker away from her. He nudged her ribcage with his boot.

  No reaction.

  He dropped, balancing on his heels, and brushed back the moist blond hair from her face. Grabbing her chin, he shifted her head, turning her face to him. Dead weight.

  Back to the sleeping angel.

  Angel asleep. Demon awake.

  He sighed and stood.

  For a long moment he stared down at her.

  Just as he was about to turn and walk out the door, his legs bent on their own accord and he slipped his left arm behind her back and his right under her knees. He lifted her, carrying her to the bed, and he set her on the rosy silk coverlet.

  Fully intending to leave, he stepped away from the bed but then glanced at her one more time. Her left arm, still encased in the long kidskin glove, had landed unnaturally folded under her back.

  That would eventually hurt.

  With a sigh, he stepped back to the bed and settled her arm naturally alongside her torso, decidedly averting his gaze from her nipples peeking through the still wet fabric across her bodice.

  With a sneer of disgust at his own action of mercy, he abruptly turned from her, grabbing the dagger off the chest and the iron poker from the floor before stalking to the door.

  He’d be getting his answers from her soon enough.

  One way or another.

  { Chapter 3 }

  A dream.

  A dream she was not at home in Vinehill. Somewhere far away. Indescribable. Anger coursing through her. Anger. Rage. And then a man out of nowhere. Jacob? Lachlan? No. Not her brothers.

  The dark-haired man walked toward her, a dagger in his hand. Her dagger. How did he get her dagger?

  Torrie’s voice in her ear. Crying. Screaming. Begging her for help. Begging her to kill her. Sloane spun in a circle, searching for her cousin. Searching for a way to squelch her suffering.

  A full circle and she again faced the man with her dagger morphing in and out of focus.

  A dream slipping away.

  She cracked her eyes open. Darkness. Darkness all around her. Stuffy air, almost suffocating.

  Her eyes opened wider. No, not complete darkness. Slivers of moonlight eked in through the window. Coals glowed orange in a fireplace across the room.

  Coals that should be on the opposite side of her.

  She reached up, feeling the headboard above her. She wasn’t upside down in bed.

  Her head flipped on the pillows, her eyes seeking out the moonlight. The curtains weren’t drawn, so why only slivers?

  Slats—shutters. The windows in her bedroom didn’t have shutters.

  Where was she?

  Her head weighing a thousand stones, she rolled to her side, lifting herself upright. The tips of her boots touched the floorboards. Why was she wearing boots in bed?

  With a heave upward, she gained her feet and staggered toward the glowing coals in the fireplace. Onto her knees, and her fingers stumbled in the darkness until she found a chunk of wood sitting beside the fireplace on the marble hearth. She lifted it, pushing the edge of it into the glowing coals. The last thing the air in the room needed was more heat, but she couldn’t see a thing.

  The bark of the wood quickly caught flame and with the light she looked around at her surroundings. A bedroom—pretty with light colors decorating the room. White walls. Peach and rose-colored fabrics. A sturdy chest of drawers along the wall by the windows. A tester bed with thin, graceful lines. A plump wingback chair by the fireplace two feet away from her.

  She was lucky she didn’t stub her toe on the chair in the darkness.

&n
bsp; Her eyes closed for a moment as her chin dipped to her chest.

  She recognized this room. The room from her dream.

  She sank backward, landing with a thud on her backside as her eyes opened.

  The dream—not a dream. Reality. The man. The man that had been in this room demanding things from her—real. What had he demanded?

  Her mind raced back hours.

  Her name.

  He wanted to know her name.

  And she wanted to know where she was.

  She’d been at Vinehill, safe in her bedroom, and now she was here. How could that be?

  The man had told her—what was this place? Wolfbridge? A castle?

  Her gut sank.

  He was holding her captive in this room. He’d said so himself.

  Why?

  Who in the bloody hell did he think he was?

  Her hand went to her forehead, rubbing it, trying to coax memories forward.

  Reiner. He’d said his name was Reiner. And he wanted to know something from her. He wanted to know who she worked for. What she was doing there.

  Surely she was still caught in a dream.

  Her right hand dropped from her forehead and she went to pinch her left arm. Soft leather caught under her fingertips.

  She looked down. Why would she be wearing a long kidskin glove so far up her left arm? That did nothing to help abate the heat in the room.

  Flummoxed, she peeled the leather down her arm and off her hand.

  She saw it instantly, but didn’t recognize what it was.

  Only that it was horrifying.

  Her left hand shaking, she lifted it to the light of the fire to find strings of thick white skin wrapping, twisting around her forearm. The skin between it bright pink. Scars. Grotesque.

  It wasn’t her arm. Not her arm.

  She screamed. Trying to brush it—scratch it—off her limb, trying to scrub the thick, tough scars from her skin. They didn’t move.

  “Get it off. Get it off. Get it off.”

  The screams came one after another, her fingernails digging into her scar tissue, trying to rip it from her body, rip it away. It wasn’t hers. It wasn’t her arm. Not her arm. Not her skin.