by Diane Darcy
If so, it was working beautifully.
Looking into the dark eyes of the young man directly in front of her, Jillian felt hope slipping away. Those eyes, the color of coffee, were pitiless, ruthless and mocking. She was in deep trouble.
Her hand tightened to the point of pain on the vial of pepper spray, still hidden by the long sleeve of her jacket. Could it disable all four of them? She was afraid if she tried to use it, it would only anger them and have unwelcome consequences for herself.
She swallowed audibly. “What do you want?” she asked again.
The boy directly in front of her took a swaggering step forward, his dark hair half-covering one eye, a smirk spreading on his face. Tall and lean, he wasn’t bad-looking, but his intense stare, sharp-boned face, unnaturally dark hair, and black wardrobe intimidated.
“That there is an interesting question, isn’t it, lads?” his deep voice, lyrically charming, struck her as incongruous in the situation. His smile widened to include his buddies. “What do we want?” His face bent toward her own and his smile disappeared. “Well, what are you offering?”
His friends laughed again, low and ugly.
Jillian choked back a sob and lifted a trembling hand to ward him off. “What are you going to do?” She glanced at the others, hoping for compassion, a hint of pity or disquiet, but could see in their eyes they meant to harm her.
The sweat on her body chilled, her heart continued its relentless thumping, and her throat tightened. She couldn’t seem to get enough air into her lungs, but her chin lifted defiantly and she straightened.
Come what may, she’d go down fighting, not cowering. If they planned to hurt her, they weren’t going to come away unscathed. Her hand tightened on the pepper spray. She could hurt them. She could leave DNA under her fingernails to convict these men later.
Of course, if they were looking for DNA under her nails, chances were she’d be dead, so it wouldn’t personally do her much good. She’d watched too many Cold Case Files not to be kicking herself right now. Why had she isolated herself? Stupid, stupid, stupid! She knew better. One minute she’d been peacefully enjoying the countryside, and the next hunted and afraid this might be her last day on earth. Her last hour. And it was her own fault!
“What do you want?” She asked the question again, more calmly this time. “Why are you chasing me?”
All four of the men snickered, obviously loving the power they held over her, damn them. The power of life and death. The man in front, their leader from the looks of things, lifted a hand. “Well, for a start, pretty girl, we like the looks of that there gold ring hanging from your neck. Why don’t you give us a look then, and after we’ll talk about anything else you may have that we might be wanting.” As the men surrounding her laughed, their leader’s gaze dropped briefly to her breasts and there was no mistaking the lascivious intent.
Her hand flew to the ring. “It was my father’s ring. The only thing I have left of him.”
“Too bad.” So quickly she didn’t have time to flinch, he knocked her hand away and grabbed the ring in his fist, scratching her chest with a long hard fingernail in the process.
Jillian shrieked, and face contorting, she turned her head to the side, lifted her right hand, sucked in a breath, and depressed the button, spraying him full in the face with pepper spray.
He screamed and her chain pinched the back of her neck as it stretched taut and broke. He dropped to his knees yelling, holding his face, and gasping.
Through squinted, burning eyes, Jillian saw the ring fly through the air, the gold flashing, and watched it land on a patch of matted grass behind the man writhing on the ground.
“Get her!” Screamed the downed man as she jumped over him, made a dive for the ring, snatched it up and ran. She shoved the ring onto her middle finger, scraping the skin and cutting her finger in the process.
With blood dripping onto the grass below, she ran, expecting to feel a hand or two quickly dragging her down. Jillian’s eyes burned and dizziness overwhelmed her. She didn’t remember tripping on anything, but fell for what seemed a very long distance. Her knee landed hard on a rock, and the pain was so intense her vision went black for a moment.
Fighting the darkness, she crawled, scrambled against a headstone, and tried to find enough purchase to pull herself up. She finally stood on both feet again, and forced her body into a limping run toward the other side of the graveyard where the graves seemed newer, better tended, and mounded with the recently deceased.
Strange that she hadn’t noticed those before.
The men hadn’t grabbed her yet, and she didn’t dare waste a second to look back. Blinded by tears, her chest and knee aching, she limped out of the graveyard only to be surrounded by men on horseback.
A sob escaped her as she stopped, stunned. Where had they come from?
She pivoted to look at the men chasing her, but no one was there. She turned around again to see a good-looking blond maneuver his horse around another to get a better look at her. He leaned forward in his saddle and smiled down at her. “Well, well, what have we here?”
Her face slack with confusion, Jillian whipped her head around again, looking for the men who’d been on the verge of attacking. There was nothing but...
Jillian gasped as a village, and the well-fortified castle beyond it came into focus.
Where was she?
She slowly turned to the men on horseback. They’d completely surrounded her now, every one of them dressed in Medieval Knight’s garb.
Had these men scared the others off? Had she hit her head? Was she unconscious and dreaming? She looked at a nearby headstone. Was she dead?
“Excuse me, sir. But can you tell me what just happened?”
The blond man’s smile turned into a leer. “With a surety I can tell you what is soon to pass.”
Jillian swallowed and tried to back up. She glanced at the faces of the men surrounding her, and each sneering, sly, suggestive grin made her wonder if she’d escaped a bad situation only to land herself in a worse one. What the hell was going on?
***
“You goatish, idle-headed, foot-licker--”
Kellen’s sword clashed with Tristan’s, cutting off his friend’s familiar insult, and he tried not to laugh as Tristan attempted to push him back. Kellen welcomed both the effort and the exuberance displayed.
Sir Owen, as well as most of the other men, had stopped training to watch. “Come, Tristan, press forward! You can defeat him! He’s been in a foul mood for months now and this is your chance to pay him in kind!”
Tristan continued to strain, his face red and damp. As Tristan was one of the few with enough experience and muscle, and therefore a slim chance in Hades of beating him, Kellen was having more sport than he’d had in months.
“Aaaahhhhh!” Tristan managed to shove Kellen off, only to fall forward. Tristan’s face went from triumphant to angry as he realized Kellen had moved apurpose and Kellen laughed out loud at Tristan’s wild expression, reminiscent of battles past.
On the sidelines, Sir Owen’s own face was becoming red and he shook a fist. “Come, Tristan, fight harder. ?Tis not our fault his bride is late in coming. Defeat him!”
Off to the side, three young boys commenced cheering for Kellen, and Sir Owen turned to chase them away. Laughing, they ran out of reach.
Kellen’s smile widened. It was the first time he’d felt alive in months. The first his spirits had lifted since his wife’s death. Tristan, breathing hard, ran at him and they took up the fight again, swords clashing, metal sliding, muscles straining, and Tristan’s frustration made Kellen laugh again. “Tired?”
“Nay, curse you, you puny, beslubbering whoreson.” Tristan hacked like a novice with his sword. “You infectious bunched-backed haggard. You cold-hearted miscreant.”
Swords clashed a few more times, then Kellen slid his sword around Tristan’s, metal slipping against metal, and Tristan was instantly disarmed. Kellen kicked Tristan’s feet out from u
nder him and set the tip of his sword against his throat.
Breathing hard, Tristan pounded the dirt with a fist, gulped in air, let it out slowly, and finally smiled his usual gamine grin. “Have I mentioned I admire such qualities in you?”
Kellen laughed again and backed away. “Many times.”
Sir Owen groaned, threw up his arms, and turned away. The men, all of whom had stopped to watch, moved back to their training.
Tristan threw Kellen a dark look as he surged to his feet and quickly retrieved his sword. “Not so many times as all that.”
“Again?”
Tristan took up his stance and Kellen started to circle.
Kellen understood the point his men were trying to make. He knew he’d been irritable, bad-tempered, and impossible to live with. Mayhap they’d all needed a good tussle to clear the air and if it had the added benefit of keeping him from brooding, so much the better.
It had been almost a year since his wife’s death and he had yet to wait another five weeks for his new bride to arrive. Corbett had already moved the date back twice. Would Kellen declare war on the Corbetts if they didn’t bring their daughter this time? He was considering it, but wasn’t sure he had the stomach for it anymore. But he needed an heir, and to his mind, they owed him one.
Two of his foster boys came running, breathing hard, excited. “My Lord, someone is on our property. We can see them from the top of the gatehouse.”
Kellen and Tristan both stopped their approach and Kellen ignored the fact that the boys had been where they should not. Their fascination with the murder hole was understandable, but dangerous just the same. “Scottish?”
One of the boys, Lord Marlowe’s son, eyes gleaming, shrugged and shook his head. “I do not know, my lord. ?Tis too far away.”
Grimly pleased, Kellen smiled. A real fight was exactly what he needed to take his mind off his problems.
Kellen turned to his men training on the field. “Mount up.”
Excited whoops from his men were followed by a quick scramble toward the stables and, minutes later, Kellen rode out with his men behind him. They quickly made their way through the village, across a vast, wet field, and closed in on the cemetery where a group of riders huddled together. Kellen was disappointed to see it was just Sir Robert Royce and some of his men.
Tristan, now riding beside Kellen, remarked, “It’s that pox-marked, fly-bitten, eye-offending lout, Royce.”
“I can see that.”
But there was nothing offensive about Royce’s looks other than the fact that he’d been born pretty enough to be female. As lads, they’d been companions, taking their training together from Lord Wallington. But Kellen’s fighting ability had caused awe and admiration among their lord, others, and finally the king. That, in turn, had caused jealousy on Royce’s part. No doubt it hadn’t helped that Kellen and the other boys had once forced Royce into a gown.
Eventually all had been forgiven and they’d fought side by side in several battles, at home and across the ocean. Afterward, Royce had tried his hand in beating Kellen at several tournaments, but of course, had as little luck as any other against him. They’d grown distant in the last few years, and even more so when Lord Wallington died on Royce’s watch, something Kellen could never quite forgive.
“Does this mean we don’t get to fight?” asked Tristan.
Kellen considered. Mayhap this would be the perfect time to rile Royce. Lax as ever, the idiot did not even see them coming as he and his men looked at something on the ground. They were laughing and Royce appeared vastly amused. Kellen, curious, signaled for his men to spread out.
Royce and his men finally turned at their approach and Kellen saw a girl in their midst. She was in a state of partial undress, wearing short breeches that formed to her figure and in no way hid a beautiful set of legs, and a tunic so tight it concealed nothing of her body.
If she’d been trying to pass as a lad, she’d failed miserably. She was attractive, curvy, blonde as his wife had been, but with short hair, just past her shoulders.
Fear was evident in the girl’s face, but the beauty’s fists were clenched and she looked ready to fight. One of the villagers? Kellen hadn’t seen her before and would have surely remembered if he had.
Royce’s men quieted as Kellen moved in, looking between Royce and the girl. “What is happening here?” Kellen asked, his mild tone apparently not putting anyone at ease as their expressions remained wary.
The girl answered before Royce had the chance. “These men are scaring me. They won’t back off. I just want to get back to my car. Could you please help me?”
Not a villager, then. Her speech was strange, but Kellen was able to sort through her words and understand most of them.
He looked around for a nearby carriage, but was unsurprised when he didn’t see one. With spring barely over, flooding had washed the road out in several places, and it wasn’t yet dry enough for cart nor carriage to travel on.
He addressed Royce. “Why are you and your men on my property? Who is this girl?”
Royce lifted his chin. “Some of my livestock went missing and we were searching out the thieves and came across the chit.”
“You were looking for your cattle on my land?” Kellen’s words were smooth as silk. “Are you making some sort of accusation?”
Royce went still for a moment, then smiled slowly, that smirky lifting of lips that always made Kellen want to punch him in the mouth. Or stick him in a dress. “Of course not. I simply think the thieves used this route. Scottish, no doubt.”
Tristan and Sir Owen moved forward to get a better look at the girl. “She does not look Scottish,” said Sir Owen. “But you never know. As weedy as your cattle are, perhaps she’s hidden the beasts behind her back?”
Kellen’s men laughed. Royce’s did not.
The girl raised a hand to her forehead as if dizzy, and Kellen froze. He couldn’t believe it when he saw the ring she wore. It looked to be the Corbett emblem. But that was impossible.
Kellen was off his horse in an instant. He quickly covered the ground between them, grabbed her arm and lifted her hand. She hit him in the chest with her free hand, but he barely noticed as he studied the ring.
There could be no doubt. The Corbett coat-of-arms, a raven in flight, glinted bright and clear in the sun. Kellen would know it anywhere, having endured Corbett’s insulting missives of excuse in past months, the raven seal always seeming to mock him.
He quickly looked about but saw no other knights, near or in the distance, only Royce’s. Could Corbett’s men be hiding? He turned to Sir Owen. “Search the trees.”
Had Corbett simply dumped her here? Was he afraid to face Kellen? Did he truly fear Kellen’s wrath enough to leave his daughter to make her own way to the castle? To leave her vulnerable to attack? It was cowardly and insulting to them both. Kellen had always respected the man in the past, but no more.
Kellen studied the girl’s face. She was lovely, with blue eyes exotically tilted at the corners and fringed with lashes as dark and thick as any he’d seen before. At least her features were nothing like those of her sister. She was even more beautiful, but in a completely different way. “Come.”
“Where are we going?” Her eyes widened when he tugged a blanket off his horse and wrapped her completely in it, noting the cut at her chest and knee, as well as the way her finger was bleeding as if someone had tried to steal the ring from her.
His anger raised a notch. She’d obviously been abused. It was yet to be determined to what extent. He grabbed her up and lifted her onto his horse before hoisting himself behind her.
“Do you have a phone I could use?”
Ignoring her strange request, he wondered if Royce’s men had arrived b efore she could make her way to the castle? Had they taken her clothes? Defiled her? He could feel his skin heating at the thought.
He turned to Royce. “If my betrothed has been injured in any way by you, or your men, you will pray for death before I am
done. I vow it.”
In the stunned silence that followed, Kellen turned his horse toward the castle. He ignored Royce’s stammered protests that he’d only just come upon the girl and took comfort in the realization that they had all been seated on horses, and only she had been upon the ground. With a rising sense of protectiveness and satisfaction, he pressed her stiff body closer to his own. He would guard and defend what was his. And she was his. Indeed, he held his future in his arms.
Excerpt from Serendipity by Diane Darcy
What if you made a New Year's resolution, then were forced to keep it?
Professor Sam Pierson should be more careful about what he wishes for. He's already as unhappy as he is obnoxious. What he doesn't realize is that his life is about to reach a new low. His boss is ready to fire him and his wife to leave him. When a disturbing stranger asks for his New Year's resolutions at a party, Sam throws everyone into hysterical laughter when he blurts out, "I want the body of an athlete and I want everyone to respect me." At midnight the stranger slaps him on the back, Sam has a sharp pain in his chest, and for the entire year, he cannot do anything that violates his New Year's resolutions.
Hilarity follows as family, friends, enemies and co-workers try and figure out what the world happened to Sam. And while Sam eventually figures out what his "problem" is, it takes him a while longer to realize exactly what he needs to do about it.
Chapter One
Professor Sam Pierson stared at himself in the full-length mirror, realized his mouth hung open and snapped it shut. He cursed. Loudly. The tuxedo didn’t fit. Not only didn’t it fit, it clung to his body like a wet T-shirt on a co-ed, revealing every pound, bulge and lump he’d acquired in the three years since he’d last worn the suit. Great.
Grinding his teeth, he turned away from the reflection to pound on the master bathroom door. “Emily!” She didn’t respond and he tried the knob. Locked, of course. He pounded again. “Emily, my tux doesn’t fit! I can’t go to the party looking like this!”
