Jennifer Horseman (7 page)

Juliet stared in complete shock. His words made no sense to her, save for the last part, and for whatever difference it made, she knew then he was mad. Her fear grew large, too large for her body to accommodate. Her heart thudded with alarming force and her breaths came in huge pained gasps until they stopped altogether. She was too shocked to know she had stopped breathing until Garrett, drawing on a restraint he did not feel, raised his hand and lightly landed the back of his hand to her face. She cried out with shock rather than with pain, though the blow would have knocked her easily to the ground but for the fact he held her by the arm. "Oh no," he said, catching her up in his arms. "I won't let you faint on me, not now. Not before I've had my ounce of flesh."

Leif came over with his mount. Fear came in waves of nausea. She missed the pity in the man's eyes, pity she needed desperately to see, a revelation that a human sentiment existed, however small, among these men who came to do her uncle's deeds.

Garrett's arms came around her, bringing her to the mount. His hands never left her as he mounted his beast. She winced in pain but gave it no voice as he threw her in front of him over the saddle, knocking the wind from her. The pain changed to waves of nausea and back to pain again. She could not seem to draw enough breath and started to heave, retching as they were off in a gallop.

The wind hit her face and each lift of the horse's hooves jolted her like a hard kick in the sides. Garrett's gloved hand lay across her back to keep her in place, unaware of the sharp stinging pain this weight caused her. They soon caught up with the others, heading for the ship that was docked and anchored in plain sight of Bristol's famous garrison.

Juliet wanted to think, and thoughts did pass quickly in and out of her mind. She thought of Tomas and his grief when he discovered she died, if she would die, if this man could be persuaded to kill her rather than abuse her. Oh please, dear God, oh please! If she begged, dear God, begged and pleaded and dropped to her knees, would he simply keep taking a hand to her face until she stopped? How much pain can a person endure before the body decides to die, for mercy's sake? Yet all these thoughts registered dimly, quickly, struggling through the pain and fear, until—

Until through the blur of her tears she saw the dagger tied by a strap above his boot. Her small hands reached across for the jeweled dagger. She knew not to think but to strike without thought or purpose. Using all her strength and effort she twisted and lifted up, slicing across his arm and halfway over his chest.

Garrett lost the reins to grab her hand, moving faster than she could see. The great beast reared high in the sky, throwing her hard against him. She felt a sickening snap of her wrist. She screamed without sound as she flew through the air and landed hard on the ground. The air bolted from her lungs, then, mercifully, she lost consciousness.

Garrett was well known for the trick of turning falls into jumps. Only the soles of his boots touched the earth as he landed on the ground. He moved to where the girl lay still and lifeless and saw the bruise forming where he had caught that painfully thin wrist a mark to match the one on her face. Dear God, how could such delicate beauty exist with such a cold and black heart?

Leif came to his side, handing him a cloth to wipe the blood from his chest and arm. "I don't suppose you can blame her for trying."

"No," Garrett agreed, a coldness growing over his own heart. "I don't blame her for that." He bent down and lifted her up into his arms, shocked by how terribly small she felt in his arms and how fragile she seemed, an impression that was incongruous with the enormity of her sins. He stared down at an angel's face and whispered under his breath, "The devil's disguise indeed."

Leif turned away, knowing perfectly well that the devil could not make those eyes. Yet he didn't know how to convince Garrett of it, not when the immovable weight of reality said differently.

Pain shot from all parts of Stoddard's body. His arms and legs were tied and he slumped on the floor. A broken rib punctured his lungs. Each breath burned as if fueled by fire. A bloodied bruise on his forehead mixed blood and sweat, which streamed down the lines on his face, wetting his palate with a salty-sweet moisture he would never live long enough to forget. Various bruises brought a painful awareness of parts of his body he had never thought of: his arms and shoulders, his lower back, and his left leg. The only place he didn't feel pain was in his right leg, which only meant it was broken.

He'd seen many men die for less; he had made many men die for less. He would not give the bold man who claimed the name Black Garrett the pleasure; he'd fight Vulcan himself to stay alive. He'd never let him touch a single hair on Clarissa's head, not that there was a chance in hell of abducting her in broad daylight with the grooms at the house and the garrison in Bristol. The miracle was that they got this far. He'd make them pay with their lives for each bloody step.

The next breath made him sputter and curse, his mind filling with images of the way he would punish this man, whoever he really was. The insane boldness of the measure made him half believe the man actually owned the famed traitor's name! As soon as the garrison arrived and rescued him, he'd make the bastard pay. He would not even wait to take him off this ship. First, the same castration the man sought to avenge, only unlike before, the cut would not lead to death. No, death would come slowly to this savage. . . . Yes, he'd fight to live long enough to hear the man's screams!

He closed his eyes, only to see the cheering faces of the crowd of his own workers watching him carried on board this ship, battered and bruised and half dead from being dragged like a carcass through the streets. Oh, they would pay too; he'd remember each one. . . . The faces faded gradually as he slipped into a hazy unconsciousness. He would kill him. ... He would kill him. . . .

Stoddard woke to sharp jolts of a new torment, his pain changing size and shape. He could not guess how long he had endured it. An hour? Less? He looked across the strange space of the room, his vision blurred but good enough to see soft morning sunlight still streaming in through the port windows. He heard men outside, readying sails, a commotion of some kind.

The garrison, dear God, where was the garrison?

He tried to keep focused on the space he found himself in, but the sting in his eyes kept blurring it. He knew from a life of shipping and ships that the unusual room had to be the captain's quarters, if only because of its size. Instead of the set of three or four rooms normally used by captains or masters of the ship, this man's quarters was one large space, as if he had knocked down the walls of decency that separated the sleeping berth from the dining room and the captain's study. A library of books covered one whole wall, too, the expensive and precious tomes neatly shelved on racks, frivolously left on a ship to rot in the moist sea air. A huge table for twelve occupied the middle of the room, an enormous desk and chair faced a sitting area with reading chairs and a sofa built to the wall, these latter done in leather and dark blue velvet. The entire corner was used for a bed as large as any in a house, this canopied in the same dark blue velvet as that of the sofa and chairs.

The queerest things were to be found in this devil's workshop; half of them were live creatures. An incomprehensible contraption of metal, wheels, and wire sat near the desk; it was moving like a clock. A long glass like a telescope stood near it. A large red, green, and yellow parrot sat on a perch near the table, looking at him, saying over and over as if to torment him, "Bawk, damnation, bawk, damnation ... all hands, I say, bawk, damnation ..." A long glass tank was built into the wall near the sofa, and inside were tiny living fish. A white tabby cat watched him wearily from the desk. More than one obscene wood carving decorated the space. He saw so many other strange things that he began to think he was hallucinating from the loss of blood. ...

The thing that frightened him without reason was the large stuffed black panther sitting atop the bookshelves, for it looked almost alive. A black creature with round eyes of gold watching him, smiling wickedly. He knew he was hallucinating when the long tail began to lift and fall, lift and fall, lift and fall. . . .

Stoddard was next awakened by a weak eruption in his chest, a cough and a sputter. He woke just in time to hear the call to raise the anchor. His "Nooo!" came with surprising force, and he weakly struggled with the bonds tying him. Once they set sail there would be less than an hour for the garrison to follow, and it would mean an exchange of fire at sea—

Voices sounded outside the door, and he heard that voice, his captor's voice. "Here, take the girl. Rouse her and fix her arm. I want her conscious. . . ."

No, dear God, not Clarissa! Not my beautiful blue-eyed little girl who looked more like her mother than the other she-creature sprung from her womb. Clarissa belonged only to him, his sacred gift when her mother left. He'd kill any man who laid a finger on her. He shut his eyes tight, praying for the first time in his life. A small thud sounded. "Bawk, all hands, big trouble, bawk!" Stoddard opened his eyes to see the panther-like cat slowly pacing in front of him, and he screamed . . .

Juliet stirred beneath an unpleasant scent. She opened her eyes to see the nightmarish shape of the red-haired devil, not the giant but a young man. She stopped her scream with a gasp and instinctively backed against the wall. Her eyes grew wide as she waited to see what form her torment would take.

"Jesus, if you don't look like you've left the world with ideas of heaven only to see the fire instead." Gayle dipped a cloth in a bowl of cool water and wrung it out with sure steady movements, then raised it to her head. She tensed and looked about as if for an escape. "Oh no, angel face," he said in a voice of whispered concern, "don't look at me like that. I'm not the one you have to be frightened of. As you can see, Garrett is not here with us. He'll be coming for you soon enough, and you can save your terror for then!"

She watched the young man with mistrust, grasping little beyond the fact that she was alone with him in a small neat room made entirely of wood. Bottled jars lined the room, ceiling to floor, kept in neat racks. A workbench and two stools sat in the middle. She did not know what to make of anything else she saw. With the exception of the bunk, it all seemed beyond description.

She flinched as he put the cloth to her forehead, but his hand was shockingly gentle. "In all my days, I've never seen a bruise like that on a girl. How did it happen?"

She ventured no reply but shook her head. She remembered everything all at once. "I fainted—"

"Hardly. You had the admirable but foolish courage to take a knife to Garrett, a thing no man I know of would try. If I hadn't seen it with my own eyes, I would not have believed it possible from a girl. You were thrown from his mount, remember?"

His voice had the clear, surprising ring of breeding, edged with concern and unmasked pity. She remembered it was his hand that landed the blow to knock Tomas out. She had no reason to trust his concern, every reason not to. He dipped the cloth again and wrung it, returning it to her forehead. She stopped him with a touch, blurting out the pressing question, "Does he mean to, Oh God . . . , will he kill me?"

The touch came as a shock, her fear did not. Gayle looked from the large blue eyes to the hand on his arm, small and frail, as pale as snow and as soft as a kitten's underside. He cursed softly when he felt the slight tremble of it. It was hard to imagine that hand lifting anything more than a teacup, yet alone Garrett's own dagger. It was impossible to imagine the girl committing Edric to death.

"You are in trouble, I can't deny it." He set a clump of long strips of cloth on the small bunk and lifted one to begin binding her wrist. "Garrett has the well-deserved reputation of being one of the most dangerous men alive. I know of no man who could survive his wrath. You don't look like-"

An enormous dog barked in a whimper and jumped against the closed door, his weight slamming it open. Juliet normally nourished a great love for creatures, but her nerves were strung to the breaking point with ideas of things worse than death and she gasped, pressing back against the wall. The huge mastiff—larger than most men by weight—whimpered at her distress, cowering when Gayle ordered him gone in a tone of irritation. "Get your cowardly ass out of here, Brute!" The dog promptly obeyed, so timid he left on his haunches, creeping away like a mouse.

Gayle took her wrist and expertly bandaged it to a small wood brace, his fine blue eyes studying her intently. "Here," he reached to the table once he was finished, handing her water, "drink this." He watched as she put the tin cup to her lips and felt the cool fresh water travel down her throat. "My father is as sharp as Garrett himself, and he has the sight; he says you're as innocent as you look. Are you?"

What could he mean by that? Innocent by whose standards? Not her uncle's, but how could he ask when he had seen her with Tbmas? "Innocent or no," she cried in a frightened whisper, "I don't think I should be killed for it!"

Garrett heard the cry as he pushed open the door. She had to stop from screaming upon seeing him standing there, so tall and dark and ominous, this monster of a man haunting her nightmares. He wore no shirt or boots now, and he looked so terrifyingly strong, nothing but hard-worked muscles. She could swear the neat line of the dagger across his chest had already faded. The most dangerous man alive, he had said. The rage in his gaze alone made him so. Her situation worsened when she saw the open bottle of spirits swinging from one hand. Her uncle always drank the times he meant to beat her. . . .

He stepped inside as he said, "I already promised I'm not going to do anything so pleasant as kill you." He motioned to Gayle without a glance.

The young man stood to leave. "She can't survive long."

"Long enough, I hope. Get Tonali out of my quarters, he is wild with the blood in there."