Heather and Velvet (31 page)

“Then she’s one dead lass, ain’t she?” Tiny’s voice roughened at Sebastian’s flinch. “Forget about her. She ain’t been nothin’ but a noose ’round yer neck from the moment ye laid eyes on her. Ye don’t owe her anythin’.”

Emotion sharpened Sebastian’s eyes to steel. Tiny had seen that look before, late at night when the others were snoring in their bedrolls and Sebastian stared moodily into the dying flames of the campfire.

“Oh, I owe her something. And if I ever get my hands on her again, I’ll give it to her.”

He kicked his mount into a canter, crumpling the mask in his fist. He would live and die in such a mask. If D’Artan didn’t get him, the hangman would. He had been a poor, deluded fool to let a lovely girl with husky laughter make him believe otherwise.

As Sebastian drew the mask over his head, the first snowflakes drifted out of the paling sky.

Prudence huddled against the coachman’s shoulder as a gentle slope lurched into a steep uphill trail. She slipped a hand out of her muff and buried it in Sebastian-cat’s silvery fur, flexing fingers stiff with cold. He rewarded her with an adoring purr, sheltered from the wind by her sturdy redingote.

Not even a blizzard would drive her back into the musty confines of the carriage. She had endured the first leg of the journey from Edinburgh with Devony’s stays digging into her side, Squire Blake snoring in her ear, and Boris slobbering on her knee. At their last stop, ignoring Tricia’s halfhearted protests, she had given her seat to Boris and
chosen the company of MacKay’s laconic Scottish coachman.

The coachman reached out a steadying arm as they jolted through another rut. Prudence’s already battered hip struck an iron bolt, and she winced. They had been forced to stop twice earlier and push the lumbering vehicle out of the frozen ruts worn by the unexpected February rains. The last try had taken the combined efforts of the coachman, the two outriders, and all the occupants of the coach, including a snuffling Devony. Only Boris had been allowed to stay in the carriage. The Great Dane had poked his sleek head out the window like a visiting dignitary.

As they started up a slope gashed in the mountainside, the hooves of the outriders’ horses tattooed a crunchy beat against the thin quilt of snow. Prudence sent a cloud of warm breath floating into the brisk air. A primitive excitement stirred in her breast at the beauty of this alien land. Jagged mountains split the bleak sky in misty peaks of blue and silver. On a slope across the glen, a herd of creamy sheep huddled, their inquisitive black faces turned to the sky. Far below, a loch twined through a narrow glen only to be swallowed by a swirling curtain of snow.

She shivered, thinking of Sebastian out there somewhere, lost in the wild majesty of the Highlands. But if he took the bait she and MacKay were so openly offering, he wouldn’t be lost for long.

Prudence considered their plan worthy of any of Devony’s sordid novellas. D’Artan’s proposal had only forced their hand. She didn’t know whether to giggle or cry as she imagined Sebastian’s reaction when he discovered she was traveling to wed Killian MacKay, his most despised enemy, within the fortnight.

Once they reached Strathnaver and MacKay’s castle, the plan was simple. She would have the coachman drive her around in MacKay’s carriage, alone and unprotected, until Sebastian found her. Then all she had to do was calmly and rationally convince him that MacKay was not the wicked ogre he believed, but only a kind old man haunted by a lifetime of regrets. A man who had the riches and resources to help Sebastian build a new life free from both the shadow
of his grandfather and his past. And free from her if he chose. Her cool plot always faltered at that point. She gave Sebastian-cat a hard squeeze. If their wild scheme didn’t work, she feared she and MacKay would have only regrets to share.

She refused even to consider that Sebastian might have left Scotland altogether, spirited away by either D’Artan or the law. Or that he might strangle her before she had a chance to explain.

Her heart plummeted as the coach took a dive, then thumped to a halt with ominous finality.

Tricia slammed her parasol into the coach roof. “Onward, driver. Give the horses their heads.”

“I’d like to give ’em yer head,” the coachman muttered.

He climbed off his perch, tipping his hat to Prudence in apology. She clambered down after him with Sebastian-cat draped over one arm.

The coachman wrenched open the door. “Everybody out,” he barked. “That slobberin’ beast as well.”

It was not Boris, but Squire Blake who first emerged, sheepishly rubbing his eyes.

“Well, I never—” Tricia huffed her way out with Devony treading on her skirts.

The ribbons of Tricia’s Leghorn hat streamed in the wind. The winter light was not kind to her complexion. Hectic patches of color stained her cheeks and nose. Powder gathered in the faint crevices around her eyes.

The coachman pointed into the coach. “Him too, or I ain’t pushin’.”

“But my big fellow might get his wittle paws all dirty,” Tricia crooned.

Prudence’s spirits sank. If they had to walk, Tricia would doubtless ask her to carry the dog.

Boris proved to be as stubborn as the coachman. Squire Blake hauled on his emerald-studded collar, but the dog would not budge. Only Tricia’s coaxing finally moved him. Prudence watched in doleful silence as the last of the tea biscuits disappeared down his yawning maw. He padded out and sniffed at Sebastian-cat, then licked his rubbery chops.
Prudence hoped they weren’t to be without food for very long.

With the help of the outriders, they managed to jog the coach into a rocking motion. With a sickening creak, the wheels tilted, throwing the coach deeper into the rut.

Tricia swore at the coachman. He bellowed back at her. Boris caught the coachman’s coattail between his yellowed teeth and tugged. Squire Blake tried to soothe them all while Devony burst into tears, wailing that wintering in Scotland was the most ridiculous idea anyone had ever had. If Prudence had chosen to wed that nice viscount instead of some Scottish savage, they could be jaunting through the south of France right now.

Prudence sank down on a rock. Icy daggers of wind dried the sweat on her brow. She pulled her shoulder-cape tight around her shoulders, chilled by the memory of D’Artan.

On the day her betrothal to Killian MacKay was announced, a pale mask had dropped over the viscount’s face, his tension revealed only in the pinched creases around his lips. He had packed and vanished from the Campbells’ that same afternoon.

An eerie cry echoed over the mountains. Prudence stiffened. The others fell into silence. A quivering ridge of hair stood erect on Boris’s back.

“A wildcat?” Prudence asked hopefully.

The coachman refused to meet her eyes. He reached behind the leather seat for a battered musket as the outriders mounted and drew their own weapons. “Aye, lass. The wildest of ’em all. Into the coach, ladies.”

Squire Blake dove after Tricia and Devony. The coachman caught the waistband of his breeches and hauled him back.

He thrust a squat knife into the squire’s trembling hand. “Highlanders don’t fancy Englishmen, but they do fancy Englishwomen, if ye take my meanin’. ’Tis no matter to me if those fancy bits of baggage get what they deserve, but I’d hate to see that nice little lass torn apart by a pack o’ Highland rogues.”

He turned to find Prudence standing behind him, her
face drained of color, but her eyes sparkling with a fevered excitement. The coachman handed her into the carriage without a word.

The door slammed. Boris’s eyes gleamed eerily out of the darkness. Prudence stuffed Sebastian-cat into the deep pocket of her redingote. It was a much tighter squeeze than it had once been. The Great Dane growled, fouling up the close air. After the icy purity of the mountain, Prudence felt as if she were smothering. Tricia stared blindly ahead, her face expressionless.

“I warned Papa we shouldn’t have come to Scotland,” Devony said. “I’ll probably be ravished by that Dreadful Scot Bandit again.”

“Not if I can help it,” Prudence replied evenly. Her heart slammed against her rib cage in a wild song of hope.

“Why, I might even be ravished by an entire gang of bandits!” Devony added cheerfully.

The high-pitched wail came again to be answered by another, then another. The pounding of hooves roared nearer. A musket cracked.

“No,” Prudence whispered.

She had envisioned a dramatic cry of, “Stand and deliver,” followed by surrender. It had never occurred to her that Sebastian’s men might shoot the nice coachman, or worse yet, that the nice coachman might shoot Sebastian.

“No!”

She flung open the coach door, eluding Tricia’s wild grab for her skirts.

She spilled into the road in a tangle of petticoats. Her hands flew up to cover her face as hooves pawed the air above her head. She rolled to the side, cradling Sebastian-cat from her weight, then crawled frantically away, dodging the thrashing forelegs of one horse and the heaving belly of another. A filthy hand skittered across her hair. She ducked away. The man snarled a curse.

Her spectacles dangled from one ear. She grabbed them and bounded to her feet, jumping up and down to scan the melee for a glimpse of a blond giant, a carrot-headed elf, or a dashing highwayman in plaid and kilt.

Hulking goblins churned to and fro, hurling oaths and
firing their pistols in the air. One of the outriders’ horses, riderless now, plunged down the hillside. A motionless hump of lace lay beside one of the coach wheels. Prudence realized with horror that it was Squire Blake. The coachman went down under one blow of a blunt club. A squat creature leaped from his horse and ripped the carriage door off its hinges. He ducked into the carriage and reappeared with a shrieking Devony thrown over his shoulder. Her long blonde hair streamed down his back.

Prudence didn’t realize she was screaming herself until a brutal hand caught her hair. “Stop yer yappin’, lassie, or Big Gus’ll give ye somethin’ to yap about.”

The man forced her head back and thrust his face into hers. The stench of his breath choked her. Beneath the shapeless mask, Prudence saw no eyes, only a bulbous, milky film. A new scream tore from her throat. Sebastian-cat clawed his way out of her pocket and darted between the flailing legs of the horses. Ignoring the tearing pressure in her hair, she lunged after him.

As the butt of a pistol came down on the back of her head, Prudence realized too late that she had caught the wrong bandit.

L
ulled by the rocking jolt of the horse beneath her belly, Prudence slipped in and out of consciousness.

When the rocking stopped and the rough hand anchored at the small of her back vanished, she started awake. A rush of disorientation was replaced by creeping dread as she remembered what had happened. All of her fears flooded back, intensified by the blurry darkness, the cold, and the brusque cadences of strange masculine voices.

Her hand went instinctively to the chain around her neck. Mercifully, her spectacles were still there, tangled in her hair.

She slipped them on. A ragged Highlander squatted before a pile of brush. He glanced at the horse and caught her somber gaze. A leering grin twisted his mouth. The first crackle of flames sent light spilling over his face, illuminating a puckered slit where his nose should have been. The man gave a menacing rumble of laughter as Prudence flung herself off the horse.

She hit the ground running. The formidable dark shapes of Highlanders and trees blended as she fled from one
cluster of men to the next, searching for Tricia or Devony. Mocking laughter followed her. Fires sprang up in the clearings between the trees, throwing an eerie web of shadow and light over the bandits’ camp. She stumbled over a rolled blanket, biting back a shrill scream before realizing the hand that clutched her ankle was only a gnarled branch. She spun around and crashed into a broad chest.

A burly ogre caught her elbows and wet his lips with a hearty smack. A patch covered his right eye. “Miss me, darlin’? Big Gus was comin’ right back. I wanted to get our blankets spread. A pretty wee thing like ye shouldn’t have to sleep on the ground.”

A man behind Big Gus guffawed. He jerked his thumb toward a gaping hole in the hillside covered by a tattered fur curtain. “
He
won’t like it. Ye’d best tell him afore ye go spreadin’ anythin’.”

Prudence wouldn’t have thought it possible, but Big Gus’s expression turned even uglier. “Curse the bugger, Jordy. He was too damned drunk to go raidin’ with us. Does he think he’s goin’ to just lay back and enjoy the spoils?”

“No,” another man said. “He thinks the spoils are goin’ to just lay back and enjoy him.” He sniggered nervously.

Big Gus’s good eye narrowed to a venomous slit. Prudence twisted around, following his sullen gaze to the cavern. The faint light of a lantern within gave it an unearthly glow.

Big Gus captured Prudence’s hand in one of his scarred paws and tucked it under his arm. The butt of his pistol dug into her ribs. “To hell with the pretty lad. I caught this wee English lass and by God, I’m keepin’ her.”