The Wolf Duke

by K. J. Jackson

  He leaned in, his lips landing on her neck, his tongue caressing circles against the fine cords of muscle. “I believe in our bodies colliding. I believe the moments when we are pressed into each other possess the rightest thing I’ve ever felt in my life.” He pulled up slightly, his look searching her eyes. “I believe for all the suspicion still laced in your canny blue eyes, you want to believe me. And are trying desperately to do so.”

  She held his look for an extended, quavering breath.

  But then she jerked a step backward, empty air filling the space between them. “I don’t ken, Reiner. I want, I want to believe you—I just”—she spun from him and moved to the door—“I just need a moment of fresh air. I need to think.”

  Before he could say a word, she was out the door, her footsteps racing down the hall and stairwell.

  Reiner stood in her room. Stood and stared at the door for thirty seconds. He turned to the front window and searched the main road. In a flash, her dark skirts appeared against the grey gravel of the road and she moved down the lane toward the edge of the village.

  He was going to follow her, whether she liked it or not.

  But he’d give her a modicum of space. After another thirty seconds of watching her walk down the road, he turned to the door, but then spied her open valise on the bed.

  He paused and went over to it, rifling through the contents. Chemise, cloak, dress, stays, and stockings. Nothing else. Just as he was about to put the contents back into the bag, his forefinger slipped along the inside bottom seam of the bag. It shifted.

  He picked at the edge of the fabric a moment, and it lifted. A false bottom.

  Breath held, he tugged it open.

  His red ledger.

  He flipped open the leather cover. Written in his own hand, the start of transactions unveiling the web of trickery and smuggling and murder.

  With a long exhale, he looked to the window. He couldn’t see Sloane from his angle. But her presence was still with him. In his bones.

  As brutal as it was to admit, he doubted he would ever be able to shake the feel of her from his mind or his body.

  He closed the book, setting it back in place in the false bottom and restacking her belongings on top of it.

  With a sigh at his own stupidity, he spun to the door.

  He had a Scottish lass to catch.

  { Chapter 13 }

  The clanging metal ringing in her ears, Sloane walked past the last building on the road that cut through the village—a blacksmith’s shop that stood in front of a livery stable.

  She stopped at the split in the road at the end of the town. To the left, the lane rolled through hills and crags. To the right the road weaved a line through the vast misty moors that sat south of town. Barren, both directions. Neither path held much interest to her.

  Not when the only thing she could see was Reiner’s face in front of her. Raging. Gentle. Consumed with passion. Hungry—ravenous for her—for everything she was.

  She just didn’t know if she could give him what he wanted. Her. All of her.

  Not when there were still too many unanswered questions. Not when he was asking her to trust that he wasn’t the man that killed her brother. For if he was…

  If he was, then there would be no escaping the ultimate betrayal. Grandfather would never forgive her. Her brother would never forgive her.

  She would never forgive herself.

  Yet, despite that real possibility, she wanted to believe him. Believe everything he was telling her—be she a fool or not.

  Her feet veered to the right, passing by the clanging from the smithy and the horses standing outside the stables, their snouts in a trough.

  Just as she moved beyond the stables, she heard a wagon behind her and moved to the right side of the road to let it pass.

  The man at the reins on the driver’s bench tilted his head to her, his hand to his cap. Hay fluttered out past the open end of the wagon as it passed.

  She didn’t see the other man behind her.

  But she felt him as he barreled into her from behind, knocking the air from her lungs. He half carried, half threw her onto the back of the wagon, his body landing on top of hers and smothering her face first into the hay.

  Screams tore from her throat. Screams muffled by the brute atop of her and the thick bed of hay below. Screams she wished she would have saved, for no one would hear her over the constant clanking of the blacksmith.

  The brute atop her wedged a hand under her face and clamped his putrid palm across her mouth.

  She twisted, clawing through the hay for something to grasp, something for leverage so she could squirm out from under him and escape. But she couldn’t see anything. Nothing but the hay beneath her. Nothing but straw poking into her skin.

  Don’t waste energy. That’s what Lachlan would say. And he was the soldier. He knew. Save energy for when she could truly escape.

  Sloane stilled.

  And started counting. One minute passed. Two. Four. Six. Ten. The nag kept at its fast trot hauling the wagon down the road. They would be a distance away from the village now. Too far to scream. Too far to outrun.

  The man above her shifted, lifting himself to his knees.

  She stayed splayed on her belly, frozen in place.

  He removed his hand from her mouth and he grabbed her arm, yanking her to flip her over flat onto her back.

  “Where did ye put the book, wench?” His cockney accent gave him away instantly. He wasn’t local. Not from Scottish lands. Hell. Falsted must have had these men following her.

  She shook her head. “What book?”

  His meaty paw clamped around her jaw, his fingers digging into the soft flesh of her cheeks. “Don’t play dumb with me, bitch. We looked in yer room and it’s not to be found.”

  Her blood crystallized in her veins. She’d been followed. Followed all this time.

  Damn, Reiner was right.

  Lord Falsted would just dispose of her once his greedy hands got a hold of that blasted book.

  She shook her head, trying to wedge it backward into the hay and out of his grip. “You don’t need to do this.”

  “Then ye best be telling Joe where to point the wagon to retrieve it, or it’s yer neck, wench.”

  “I don’t have it.”

  His fingers tightened on her face, making her teeth cut into her cheeks. “We saw ye looking at it in that drawing room at the inn back in Carlisle, so ye cin stop yer lyin’ now.”

  “Fine. Fine.” She nodded the best she could with the clamp of his fingers tearing at her skin.

  He loosened his hold on her cheeks.

  Perfect.

  Anything to draw these two brutes away from Reiner and Milly.

  “I left it with a friend in Stirling.”

  “Ye care to share that name with us?”

  “I’ll not put him in danger.”

  His hand flashed through the air, the slap striking her cheek. “Then ye’ll be coming with us to retrieve the book.”

  She nodded, hoping she cowed adequately for him. The pain of the slap alone helped with that. She had no intention of letting these two drag her to Stirling, but the more docile and afraid they thought she was, the better.

  The brute rocked back onto his heels and flipped to sit on his backside. His back propped against the side rails and he stretched his legs out long across the back of the wagon.

  Sloane used the moment to scoot herself as far away from him as she could, shifting upright to see her surroundings. She could no longer see the village and there wasn’t another soul on the road. Alone with nothing but the misty moors surrounding them on both sides.

  Her head snapped up.

  Empty moors. Empty moors that shifted into bog-land.

  She searched the bogs that lined the road. Peat bogs as far as she could tell. Her head tilted down, she snuck a long assessing glance at the brute stretched out behind her. Everything about him indicated he was a city dweller. Soot-stained clothes. His accen
t. His smell. She shifted her gaze to the driver of the wagon. She couldn’t see the front of him, but his ill-fitting clothes were the same.

  What did a city dweller know about bogs?

  With any luck, nothing.

  Her mouth closed tight and she inhaled a long breath to fill her lungs, then coiled.

  She waited for the brute in the back to look behind them and she jumped, leaping over the side of the wagon.

  Straight down the embankment toward the bog.

  It was a risk. But this was land she knew. Land she could identify. Land they could not. And they wouldn’t be so stupid as to follow her into a bog.

  She spied her first chunk of solid ground to leap onto. One leap. Two. Her foot slipped, the toe of her boot splashing into water. Arms swinging, she caught herself. Three. Four leaps.

  Ignoring the shouts behind her, she hopped and jumped from one clump of solid ground to another, avoiding the mushy wet mosses in between that would for sure sink her to her death.

  Bogs were like that. Hungry for humans.

  But she didn’t intend to be eaten.

  Her eyes scanning the grasses, searching for solid lumps, her concentration stayed fully on the ground before her. She was forty steps into the bog before she realized the brutes were following her, their bitter swearing getting louder and louder.

  She glanced over her shoulder. The thin driver was faster, more nimble as he slipped and scampered across the squishy spots of the bog.

  He didn’t even see it as his fellow brute dropped behind him. One loose foothold, and the blackguard slipped, sinking into the muck of the bog.

  His arms flailing, he struggled to stop the sinking, grasping at grasses, screaming.

  Sloane wanted to shout out for him to still. To calm.

  But it was too late. Panic and his massive form were exactly what the bog wanted. What the bog feasted upon.

  The brute’s head slipped below the moss and his hand went motionless, still clutching a fistful of grass.

  Swallowed.

  She shouldn’t have stopped. Shouldn’t have looked back. For in the next breath the driver was almost upon her.

  “Stop right there, ye fuckin’ bitch.” He stretched out with his long limbs, his fingers snagging her left wrist.

  Sloane yanked her arm and leapt onto the next mound closest to her—or what she hoped was a mound. His fingers slipped off her arm in midair, and the sudden absence of resistance sent her flying too far. She slid off the mucky grasses, her right knee and arm sinking into the bog.

  The solid ground not nearly solid enough.

  Behind her, a splash, and then silent thrashing. The driver had fallen face first into the bog, crashing through the top layer of moss. What little there was of his backside stuck high in the air went still, then slowly started to slip below the moss.

  Swallowed.

  Sloane couldn’t spare even a thought for the brute, as her right arm and right leg were quickly being sucked into the thick muck of the bog.

  She froze in place, attempting to fight the panic threatening to take over her muscles. Her eyes squeezed closed and she tried to conjure everything Jacob had every told her about bogs.

  Do not struggle. Do not fight against a bog. You have to fool it. Move slowly. So slowly you are tricking the bog into thinking you are still. It is the only way to dupe it. The only way to escape it.

  Her left leg was still partially on a solid clump of ground next to her left hand, her thigh shaking with the ferocity of gripping to the last thing keeping her from drowning.

  “Sloane.” A thunderous yell flew across the bog.

  She popped one eye open, then the other.

  Reiner on his horse at the road, just behind the empty wagon.

  She carefully drew air into her lungs, trying to cause no movement.

  “Reiner.” The word exhaled softly from her throat.

  “Sloane.” Panic laced the word and he jumped from his horse, charging into the bog.

  “Stop.” Her screech echoed over the bog and it cost her. She sank. Another inch toward her death. The whole right side of her body had descended into the cold tentacles of the muck.

  But she could still crane her neck upward. Still see Reiner moving into the bog.

  “Stop. You’ll sink.” Another inch down.

  He stopped, thank the heavens.

  His fingers flickered, flipping in and out of fists out of sheer frustration. “I have to come after you, Sloane.”

  The determined glint in his eye told her he was coming, death or not.

  She nodded slightly, not that he could see it. She drew a shallow breath, trying to talk without her chest moving. “Wood. A piece of wood to throw out to me. There’s no solid ground here.”

  His look went frantic around. And then he ran toward the wagon as he stripped off his coat. He tossed it onto the hay in the rear and then brought his leg high and kicked at the long planks running the length of the wagon. Five sharp blows of his heel, and one plank splintered. He grabbed the edge of it, twisting it from the frame of the wagon. It was half as tall as him and it would have to do.

  He ran back to the edge of the bog, his look frenzied on the mounds of grasses and moss. His first step out, he missed the solid ground and sank up to his shin.

  “Bloody hell.”

  “Slow. Pull it out slow.” She waited, breath held until he freed his foot.

  Once his balance was set again, Sloane watched him lift his foot and aim for another wrong area of grass.

  “Stop.”

  His foot froze in midair.

  “It’s forward to your right.”

  His hovering foot moved in the air until it was directly above a solid clump she could recognize. “Yes.” The cold muck crept upward to reach the base of her neck.

  He dropped his foot and moved to the clump.

  She exhaled. It held him.

  “Next one, Sloane.” He lifted his left foot in the air, waiting for direction.

  “Straight ahead. A foot further than you can stretch. You need to jump.”

  He leapt forward without hesitation. No skidding. Impressive for his size and weight.

  “Now to your right again.”

  “It’s sending me farther from you.”

  “Trust me.”

  He lifted his right foot.

  “Directly to your right. A long step.” Damn. The muck was crawling up her neck and she could barely see above the grasses in front of her.

  He moved.

  “Now three right in a row directly in front of you. Normal stride. Do you see them?”

  “Yes.” Three quick steps and he looked to her.

  “Now look forward to your left. Two short jumps.”

  He nodded, then jumped from one to another.

  “Stop.” Her chin dipped below the surface and she had to fight the instinct to start gasping for air before she went under.

  He looked at her. He was close enough now that she could see the terror in his eyes. He wasn’t used to this. He was huge and strong and fearless. Nothing could stop him.

  Nothing but a death-sucking bog.

  His eyes flickered down to the right. The last lump of the driver’s backside still hovered in the air. “He…” He looked to her.

  “The bog has him now. It’s not safe past where you are. The board.” She twisted her neck up as high as she could so the thick water didn’t get into her mouth.

  For a moment he looked dumbstruck, his stare was so intent on her, but then he looked down, finding the board he forgot he carried in his arm.

  “Just slowly onto your knees. Get a solid spot and don’t lose it.”

  He dropped to his knees, digging his toes into the fleshy mound. “Hell, Sloane.”

  “I hope not today.” She smiled at him.

  His look seared her in place, then he stretched the board out toward her gloved left hand sitting precariously still next to her left thigh clutching the mushy mound.

  He nudged the tip of it
under her fingers and she clutched the edge of it.

  The mud had splattered onto her glove, making the leather slippery and she swore to herself. Of all times she wished she weren’t wearing the blasted thing. She conjured a smile and looked to Reiner. “I ken you want to pull me over to you fast, but that’s not going to work.” She stopped, spitting out the mud that had just slipped into her mouth past her bottom lip. “If I lose grip, I can sink fast. So slow. Slow.”

  He nodded, then started to tug. Her leg shifted off the one solid piece of ground she was clinging to and sank.

  He pulled her, inch by inch to him until her fingers slipped. “Too fast.”

  He stopped, jabbing the board into her palm so she could re-grip the edge of the wood before she sank further.

  “Just keep your head above the water, no matter what.” The growl in his voice shook the air around her.

  “I don’t intend to die today, Reiner.”

  “Good.” His arms straining against the force of the sucking bog on her body, he got her close enough to reach her wrist.

  Done with the torture of moving slow, he flung a hand out, grabbing her wrist as he dropped the board. His strength against the bog, and he didn’t bother to slow, merely dragged her with all his might—the bog battling him with every inch gained—until she was on the edge of his mound of solid ground.

  Shifting backward onto his calves, he yanked her fully from the suck of the bog, clutching the muddy, sopping mess of her to his chest.

  “Dammit, Sloane,” he growled into the top of her head.

  “Don’t yell at me—we’re not on solid ground yet.”

  “Strip off your dress.”

  Her head jerked away from his chest. “What?”

  “It has doubled your weight—you cannot jump with that thing swinging and weighing you down. I’ll not chance you losing your balance.”

  Her look veered across the vast open bog. “But we are in the open. And it is one of the only two dresses I have with me.”

  His eyebrows cocked as his gaze swept downward. “You think it is salvageable?”

  She glanced down at the putrid muck now sunk into every fiber. “No.”

  He nodded and stretched his arms around her, his fingers working the buttons down her spine.