HerOutlandishStranger (4 page)

“Why did you think that?” she asked, then wished she hadn’t.
She had no desire to agitate him and had no notion what he might consider a
challenge.

He shook his head as if to clear it, but his voice still
sounded as if he were perplexed. “I have heard a bit about you, Miss Wickman.
Your father’s name is Edward. From England. Yes?”

She nodded and for the first time felt reassured. He knew of
her father. She smiled at him, apparently a mistake. The smile seemed to upset
him a great deal. He flushed and jumped to his feet, and even took several
paces away. Eliza quickly turned her head and pretended to scan the horizon to
allow him to recover from his strange embarrassment.

She wondered if he suffered from some sort of derangement
brought about by war. Perhaps he had seen too much fighting and had what she’d
heard her father describe as battle madness. He did not appear dangerous,
though, and she thought she might even grow grateful for his company.

She turned her attention back to him and saw that he had
hefted his sack and cloak and reached for her bag.

“No, please, Mr. White. I can carry that.”

Despite her protest, he picked up the portmanteau. She
braced herself for the possibility that he would run off, carrying all that she
possessed with him. She would never be able to catch up with him.

Instead he waved a hand in the direction of the villa.
“Shall we go?” he suggested, his voice normal again, though as Eliza had
already noted, his normal manner seemed very unusual indeed.

“Surely we should not stroll down the middle of the road,”
she said in horror as he walked along what was no more than a rutted cart
track.

“No problem. They’re long gone.” His voice seemed entirely
too loud, and she winced at the noise. He glanced back and must have seen her
worried look. “The French, I mean. And the English, too, for that matter. The
armies have finished up any looting and pillaging. I think a group of Spaniards
who support Bonaparte caused the most damage.”

His confidence was convincing. And made her suspicious. “How
are you so certain of their movements, Mr. White? Do you have some prior
knowledge?”

He seemed to think that was funny. As he laughed, she
noticed his teeth gleamed impossibly white. They also appeared as completely
straight, not a missing or crooked tooth in his mouth. Perhaps they were false,
she thought, though that hardly seemed likely—unless he came from a country of
extraordinary craftsmen.

“No, I’m not a French spy, Miss Wickman. I don’t give… I
don’t care about the French, the Spanish or even the British army’s movements.
That’s not important.”

“What could possibly be important, then?” she asked, still
guarded.

He slowed his loping stride to fall back and walk next to
her. “Huh.” He seemed to consider the question. “Getting you to your country, I
think. To England. That’s important.”

An odd answer, though truly she felt relief at his gallant
offer to help her until she was reunited with her father.

She felt she ought to protest. “Perhaps it is important to
me, but you need not worry on my behalf, Mr. White. I shall find my father and
persuade him to escape with me. You have been more than kind, but I do not wish
to trouble you any further.”

He looked at her straight in the eye, an equal at this
particular moment, Eliza reflected. He smiled, a lopsided smile that struck her
as appealing, but held either sorrow or scorn, she couldn’t judge which.
“Believe me, I have nothing better to do. Let’s go. I understand you’ve got to
see the destruction for yourself.”

He walked quickly and she frequently had to hurry after him.
She fell behind and watched his strong gait. He was well formed and often
graceful, yet occasionally, for instance when he glanced over his shoulder at
her, he seemed out of odds with his own body.

* * * * *

Mr. White proved horribly right about the destruction. By
the time they’d stumbled their way through the muddy countryside—Eliza simply
refused to stroll down the road—only a few smoldering chunks of black timber
and ashes remained of the villa. Anything valuable was gone. Anything living was
dead.

Mr. White pulled her away from the charred remnants of the
doorway, and an unspeakable object that was probably her father’s remains. “Let
me check,” he said gruffly.

He asked her to describe some kind of identifying item he
could look for so he could be sure it was Edward Wickman. But there was
nothing. The only way to identify the dreadful corpse as her father would have
been with his wedding ring, which must have been stolen along with everything
else of value.

Vaguely aware of Mr. White’s watching presence, she wandered
aimless, in a fog of grief, searching for something recognizable from the
wreckage that had been home. She walked in circles for hours—or perhaps for
only a half an hour. She had no notion of time.

“Gone, gone,” she whispered, and wondered if sorrow could
indeed bring on madness. Perhaps insanity would save her heart from entirely
shattering. Her bewildered, wandering hunt was at last ended by Mr. White. She
didn’t notice him until she felt him tug on her arm. “We need to leave now.
We’ll have to find a place to sleep.”

Eliza looked up and saw that the sun had sunk low and bathed
the scene in a soft, pink glow. How strange to observe such beauty at that
moment.

Without a word, she followed him from the devastation. She
didn’t look back. She didn’t have to. The sight of the ruins would remain
imprinted on her memory forever.

They had trudged perhaps two miles when he stopped and led
her to a dry, flat rock. A few paces away, he assembled a pile of sticks that
caught fire almost immediately. Eliza, huddled on the nearby rock, abstractedly
noticed he did possess some remarkable skills.

He was next to her again, bothering her, talking to her,
telling her to move closer to the fire, and asking her if she wanted anything
to eat. His voice seemed to come from far away. “Gah, I think you’re in shock
or some such thing.”

Here is an observant gentleman, she thought. She chose to
ignore his foolish words.

He nervously fingered an oval of wood in his hand then
stared down at it for a moment. “You should stay warm and you need to eat. And
you ought to lie down soon.”

Mr. White managed to push a bit of bread into her hand. She
shook her head, then spoke aloud for the first time in what felt like years.
Her voice caught in her tight throat and turned to a gasp. “Thank you. I will
not eat.”

He pulled the bread from her and broke off pieces, which he
nudged into her mouth, as he mumbled some nonsensical words such as “immune
system”. Every now and then he held a skin of water to her lips until she drank
a few sips. She chewed and swallowed automatically. After a while, he gently
pushed her down on the ground. No, onto a blanket. She lay on her back as he
tucked his cloak and then her own cloak on top of her.

“Sleep if you can,” he said, but she only sensed the words
as she fell into an exhausted stupor.

Jazz watched her in the firelight. The soft light shone on
her tangled hair and he picked out at least five colors in the strands, ranging
from bronze to soft mahogany. Her lips were full, and he remembered the warm
taste of them from the cave, her natural sweetness mingling with the sour wine
on her lips. She’d returned his kisses… No, he stopped himself. But he couldn’t
stop staring at her. Relaxed now, those lips could have been the plump mouth of
a child, though the other stronger lines of her face were of an adult woman.
Even by the firelight he could see that her cheeks had more color after the day
in the sun.

Nothing in his life had fascinated him as much as the sight
of her face. Except maybe the sight of her form. The warm curves under his
hands. Every time he thought of the evening before, he was filled with shame,
horror and the overwhelming craving to touch her again.

This wild-state was going to more than distract him. He
could barely function. And when she gave him that sweet beaming smile that
illuminated her face, shame filled him so he wanted to beg her forgiveness. And
yank her against him.

He watched her sleep and fought the unwelcome memories of
what he thought of as “the time in the cave”. To call it anything else made him
flinch.

He jumped to his feet. Unbelievable. He was hard and ready
again. It should have been easy to destroy the urge—he simply had to recall
those moments when he’d been with her and she drifted away from surface wakefulness,
back to the deep, drugged sleep. He hadn’t stopped his hands or his body, even
when she had lain in his hands like the dead. The first time, eh. He had to do
that.

It was the other time. That act was contemptible.

He swallowed hard, but the disgust lingered in his throat.
Right along with the harsh tang of desire that lodged there and everywhere else
in his body.

He walked a few yards away from the fire and pulled out the
CR for a quick check-in to see if any humans were in the area.

Might as well ask the CR about any possible solutions for
his annoying disturbance.

The CR was no help. “Lust. Concupiscence,” it diagnosed.

No, he’d felt lust in his life. This seemed far more
consuming. He described more of his symptoms aloud. “Eh, CR, I don’t remember
any cruddy lust symptoms like a lack of proper air intake when someone smiled.”

The CR answered at once. “Lust. Past slang descriptions
are…to develop a
tendre
, a pash, the hots, a crush.”

Jazz controlled the urge to tell the CR to stop being a
condescending ass. “CR, what’s the cure? I’ve got a job and I’m already an
amateur. I don’t need this self-involved pash nonsense.”

“Thirty grams of Nulif suppressant for immediate relief,”
the CR suggested, “followed by a longer-lasting subcutaneous dose. Double as
standard preventative for adolescence symptoms.”

“Yeah, I know, I know. If I only could,” Jazz muttered. That
was the stuff he used at home. Maybe he could find some sort of ancient form of
control. “CR, what do the natives hereabouts do when they are afflicted?”

The CR was quiet for a long second as it searched its
records. “Persons wishing to abate symptoms take potassium nitrate, also known
as saltpeter. This substance can cause gastroenteritis, high blood pressure,
anemia, kidney disease, and general weakness and torpor. It also has a
depressive effect on the heart. Therefore it cannot be recommended. Cold baths
are also mentioned. As is avoiding the object of obsession.”

Jazz made a disgusted noise. He flicked off the CR and
shoved it into his pocket. No help there. He’d have to learn to live with the
wild-state, and the Eliza woman, on his own.

Back at the campsite, he curled into as small a shape as he
could, to stay warm. The damp ground seemed to suck every bit of warmth from
him. He thought about taking out the warming cloak again, but he didn’t know
how deeply this woman slept. He didn’t want her to wake and see something that
wouldn’t be invented for a couple hundred years.

At least it wasn’t raining and at least there was a fire. He
rolled closer to the fire. All thoughts of trying to get comfortable vanished
when a voice whispered next to his ear.

“We should put it out.”

“What?” He didn’t exactly jump out of his skin, but he was
glad he hadn’t been asleep. He’d been warned that, without meds, he could be a
danger when startled awake. One of his waking nightmares was that someday
someone would attempt to shake him out of a sleeping nightmare, which might
cause him to create a waking nightmare.

Miss Wickman briefly put a finger on his mouth to silence
him and spoke in a low voice near his ear. He had to concentrate on listening
since the touch of her hand and the heat of her breath on the side of his face
brought the tiresome disturbance right back. “We must quench the fire. We do
not want to draw attention to ourselves, Mr. White.”

“Ah. Good point.” He knew the soldiers had left the area,
but he wasn’t sure about the sentiment of the locals who remained. The CR
contained records of battalions, skirmishes and soldiers’ movements but
remained vague about details like the peasants who’d survived the combat. He
knew some of the Spanish were starting to dislike their allies, the British.

Together Jazz and the woman kicked the small fire until the
last wisp of smoke blew away.

Jazz lowered himself to the ground in the almost complete
darkness. A rustle beside him along with the scent of the woman again and he
almost jumped back up.

She spoke, very softly. “I apologize for startling you
earlier. And I wish to thank you for…your assistance back—” She stopped abruptly.

“Right, miss,” said Jazz hurriedly. “I’m glad to see you’re
able to, um, function again.”

“Function? Yes.” Her voice sounded bleak. In the darkness
she held something out to him. “You were very kind, Mr. White. Thank you for
your help.” She thrust his cloak at him.

He shook his head until he realized she probably couldn’t
see the gesture now that the fire was totally out. “No, miss. I don’t really
want that.”

“Mr. White, you will take a chill,” she said, wearily. “If
you become ill, your safety will be imperiled.”

“But you must stay war—”

”I am healthy, Mr. White. But please consider this. If you
grow ill, my safety will be compromised as well. After the generosity you’ve
shown, do you think I would abandon you?”

After a few more minutes of useless argument, he took the
cloak and wondered why the Departmental experts had confidently informed him
that the women of this era always bowed to male judgment. He wrapped himself up
and found that the cloak carried her sweet, musky scent. He closed his eyes and
breathed in deeply, not even noticing the accompanying stench of wool.