The Crimson Lady (6 page)

Relieved to have proved the victor in this minor clash of wills, at least, Braedan leaned back on the bolster, not entirely feigning his fatigue, all the while trying to pretend it didn’t matter to him that Fiona had seen him naked…that she’d likely been the one who’d stripped his clothing from him. It
shouldn’t
have bothered him, he knew; she was a courtesan, after all—a woman of vast experience who had surely seen hundreds, if not thousands, of men completely undressed.

But not you
, a voice inside of him chided—not until now, anyway, when he hadn’t even been awake to say aye or nay against it.

“You must be hungry,” Fiona murmured. “If you’ll sit up a bit more, I’ll help you with this pottage.”

“Nay.”

His response was too quick and far too vehement, he knew, but he covered his awkwardness by adding in a mumble, “I’ll eat later. Just leave it here, and I’ll get to it eventually.”

“Nonsense,” she answered, plunking herself down onto the stool at his bedside.

Cursing himself for the heat he felt spreading up his neck, Braedan decided that he had better reassert his masculine independence without delay. He shifted his gaze to
her, intending to use the force of his glare to intimidate her into obeying his request. To his dismay, he saw thinly veiled amusement lighting her eyes and quirking her sensuous lips.

She raised her brow. “Stew should be eaten warm, you know. Besides, you need to rebuild your strength and quickly if we are to meet with Will as I’ve arranged for tomorrow noon.”

“You found him?” Braedan sat up straight again in his surprise, wincing both at his own sudden movement and the spoonful she thrust at his mouth.

“Aye. I was able to send word to him, and he responded in kind,” she answered, making him take the bite. “It will be an hour’s journey to reach him.”

Instinctively chewing and swallowing the richly seasoned pottage, Braedan glowered and yanked the bowl none too gently from her with a grumbled comment about being well capable of feeding himself.

That half smile flirted over her lips again, but she leaned back to watch him, seeming content as long as he continued to eat on his own. They settled into a companionable silence, the only sounds that of his spoon scraping the bowl and the birds chirping in the breezes outside the shutter. After a bit, she murmured something about tasks to accomplish and got up again to begin tidying the chamber, putting some odd-looking pots and bundles of dried herbs back into a leather purse and humming a bit as she poured water into a basin to wipe down a mortar and pestle.

Between bites Braedan watched her, noting that she seemed calmer—even more comfortable, somehow, in his presence—than he’d seen since that night he’d found her. He couldn’t help wondering what had brought
about that change in her demeanor. Was she biding her time, confident in some plot she’d hatched against him to escape? Logic denied it. The fact that he was resting here and not being held under guard gave him reason to believe that she hadn’t called in the law on him. Nay, he’d wager his sword that she’d even tended to him in his illness herself, using in the process some of those herbs that she was stowing away now. Vaguely, he remembered the sensation of swallowing some bitter liquid in the midst of his fever; it was she who was responsible, he was sure of it.

And that meant he owed her a debt of gratitude, not only for sheltering him but for helping to heal him as well.

The thought caught him for a moment, the idea of it as discomfiting as his current lack of clothing. He’d always believed women of her ilk to be self-absorbed creatures, dedicated to their own concerns above all else. The enigma of her increased with every hour he spent at her side, and he wasn’t so sure that he liked the way she kept unbalancing his neatly ordered perceptions.

Setting his empty bowl down, Braedan turned his full attention back to her. She was in the process of sweeping out the hearth now, and he noticed that she wore a kirtle of a far plainer weave and design than the crimson garment she’d donned for her first appearance at the inn. But like that magnificent gown, this one was also fitted to her shape in a way that her former dark and matronly garments never had.

It was clear that whether she wore sackcloth or silk, the true Fiona was an exceptional beauty, with a contrast of angelic face and tempting curves that would call any man still capable of breathing to sin. In fact the sight
of her now, bending and twisting as she went about her tasks, not to mention the alluring, delicate scent of her that wafted through the air as she moved by, set his pulse to racing and released an unexpected flood of heat through his body, sweeping in a direct path to his groin and hardening him uncomfortably.

Damn
.

It wasn’t like him to be so affected by a woman. Not he, the blistering sword arm of the king, used to battling for his sovereign’s right in all manner of foreign climes, surrounded by countless exotic females who offered themselves freely for his taking. Shamed, he shifted in an attempt to prevent Fiona from seeing the painfully hard evidence of his lustful reaction to her, forcing himself to look away toward the window shutter. He tried to concentrate on discerning the time of day by the amount of light outside—anything to keep his mind from the heated thoughts her nearness inspired.

He’d almost brought himself under control when she apparently finished what she was doing and sat on the stool next to him. The tantalizing whisper of her scent gripped him again, and he swallowed hard, knowing that he couldn’t avoid looking at her forever. He decided that a conversation about a necessary but uncomfortable topic might do much toward helping him suppress his disruptive imaginings.

“What have you done with my clothing?”

He willed his gaze to be steady on her as he asked the question, pleased that he managed to make his voice obey in kind.

“They are down below, in the kitchen chambers.” That hint of humor colored her tone again as she contin
ued, “I thought it best to have them cleaned while you were unable to make use of them.”

“Aye, well I have use of them now.” Braedan resisted the urge to look away from her again, despising the renewed warmth in his face. “
Right
now as a matter of fact.”

“I’ll fetch them in a moment.” She sat forward a bit and fiddled with something beneath the edge of the fitted smock sleeve at her wrist. “We need to discuss a few particulars about tomorrow first.”

“Is it that important, that we cannot converse about it after I’m fully clothed?”

“If you value your continued safety and the eventual deliverance of your foster sister, aye.”

He debated arguing further, then thought better of it. If she deemed this so important, so be it; he’d just have to overlook his less than dignified state of dress. Without saying anything he nodded his agreement.

She’d stopped playing with her sleeve, he noticed, and now she met his gaze squarely, her expression serious; he tried not to allow himself to dwell on the way the tawny hue of her eyes seemed lit with beautiful, dancing flecks of light. Clearing his throat, he murmured, “Go on, then.”

“The first matter we must needs discuss concerns my name. Those who know me through my past activities think of me only as Giselle de Coeur.”

“Even the outlaws?”

“Aye. Except for my childhood and the years that I lived in Hampshire, it has been my identity.”

“But why did you not return to your true name as soon as you left Draven?”

“It is complicated,” she answered, glancing away.
Her expression was tight and her eyes troubled. “Perhaps I still dressed in crimson and answered to that name even after leaving Draven because it had been so long since I had known anything else—it was a part of me I could not separate at first. The woman known as Giselle de Coeur also helped the outlaw group in their robberies. I only worked with them for a year, but they were able to use my notoriety to entice male travelers into stopping at the roadside. By the time word spread about the traps being laid on thoroughfares near Alton, baited with the Crimson Lady, I had already left for Hampshire.”

“I see.”

“I hope so. Because you must remember that calling me Fiona in front of anyone else could be dangerous and expose us to suspicion the likes of which you saw in the common room when we first arrived.”

He nodded. “In future I will make the correction—though it will be a bit peculiar, knowing myself to be the only person aware of your true name.”

She paused. “Actually you’re not the only one. There is one other.”

“Who?”

“Will Singleton,” she admitted, “though he, too, calls me Giselle for the same reasons that you must.” She flushed a bit then, and Braedan got the distinct feeling that there was a good deal more to her connection to this leader of her former band of thieves than she was letting on.

“And my uncle?” he asked, refusing to betray the stab of animosity that had shot through him at the thought of Will’s apparent intimacy with her. “You spent a good deal of time with him. Does he not know as well?”

“He didn’t care to learn it. He chose the name Giselle de Coeur for me on my first day with him. It is why I decided to resume my old identity as Fiona Byrne when I set up shop as an embroidress, to keep him from finding me so easily.”

“And yet I found you simply enough.”

“You were willing to go to some trouble, a long journey, and much coin. For sake of his pride, I knew that Draven would never venture that far or spend so much to find me. It would be beneath him. It was the same when I lived as an outlaw; I knew he wouldn’t come looking for me, though I was working the thoroughfares but a few hours from London. However, that might change if we actually go back into the
stewes
—”

She broke off, glancing down and biting at her bottom lip; Braedan caught a glimpse of her face and was taken aback by what he saw there, a look telling him that this woman who had lived her life on the fringes of some of the most violent segments of society was for some reason feeling hesitant…or perhaps even fearful. She seemed stricken, and lost, and—

Christ she looked like she needed nothing more than to curl against his chest and be told that he would keep her safe from all the wickedness in the world
.

The realization pounded through him; when she met his gaze after a long moment, her eyes were filled with the shadows of her need, twisting and blending in a disruptive swirl. But before he could react she spoke again, her words only adding to his dismay.

“Draven’s attempts to take me back were unsuccessful, in part because he would not allow himself to appear weak among his cohorts by instigating an open search for me. But since I will likely be traveling back into his
area of the
stewes
to gain information about your foster sister, it is only fair to tell you that if he realizes I have returned, he will almost certainly go to great lengths to…reacquire me.”

“Why?” Braedan fairly growled, shaken by the urge that had filled him, the fierce desire to protect her from anything that might cause her hurt. With ruthless force he squashed the emotion, reminding himself that he wasn’t worthy to safeguard anyone—and that she was naught but a common woman and a thief…a tool in his quest for justice, nothing more. His voice was flat, his choice of words cruel, he knew, when he added, “My uncle has more wealth than a desert prince and cannot possibly covet the amount of coin your notable talents would provide, should you resume servicing men under his direction.”

She flinched almost imperceptibly. But, thank the saints, the vulnerable look in her eyes slipped away, leaving in its wake raw pain, followed swiftly by something mocking and cold. After a long pause she answered, “You’re quite correct. It is not the coin that would prompt him, although he has always relished his wealth and sought to increase it, I can assure you. It is a far more personal reason, pertaining, as I have said, to his pride.”

“He has more than enough of that to spare, I’ll grant you,” Braedan groused, struggling to tamp down the last embers of the burning sensation in his gut. “What would be his reason, then, pray tell?”

“I escaped Lord Draven under cover of darkness those years ago,” Fiona answered quietly, “and your uncle is not a man used to losing his possessions against his will.”

She had managed to shutter her feelings from him by then, favoring a cool expression of composure that was eerily reminiscent of the look she’d worn when she’d revealed herself to everyone as the Crimson Lady. But as she’d spoken, he noticed that she’d pulled from her sleeve whatever it was she’d been toying with on and off during their conversation; Braedan only just kept himself from jerking back on the pallet when he saw that it was the dagger she’d used against him in her shop, then later on the burly man belowstairs. She kept rolling the blade along her fingers, the palm’s-length edge curving wickedly and glinting in the streaks of sun from the window as she moved it.

She noticed his reaction after a moment and gave a bitter laugh, flipping the dagger up and sliding it with effortless perfection back into the leather case he could just see now, strapped beneath her smock sleeve. “My apologies. I rarely unsheathe this without a purpose, but occasionally, when I am alone and cursed with some memory of Draven, it happens.”

“It is of no matter,” he mumbled, “it was just unexpected.”

She gave that cold smile again. “That was one of the reasons Draven commanded my mastery of the skill—for its ability to shock those for whom he ordered me to display it. It amused him, you see.” Nodding, she indicated the dressings across his chest and arms, her words biting at him this time as she said pointedly, “Though I suppose I needn’t tell you about your uncle’s perverse entertainments. It seems that you’ve experienced some of his talent in that area yourself, recently.”

“These weren’t delivered by his hand.” Braedan glanced down at his bandaged wounds, clenching his
jaw at the painful memory of their infliction. “He set one of his lackwit men to the task, though he remained in the chamber as witness.”