What could she do? She wished there were some way she could help them. Her eyes swept down, scanned Robertson’s body, lying in a bloody heap. She shuddered.
She felt the man behind her stiffen. Had he seen Rollo? Should she scream? Create a distraction? Stomp on his foot? She was helpless. Powerless. The feeling chilled her.
Events slowed, her perception the sluggish click of a camera shutter.
The guard behind her was beginning to shout a warning.
Her eyes went back to the bearded man. Would he run his blade through Ormonde? She watched him, watched in dreadful slow motion, focused, absurdly, on that beard. A curled moustache atop a pointed, brown goatee. Ridiculous.
But then the man made the strangest face. A look of surprise. Then an eerie, blank sort of expression suffused his features. His eyes, deadened. His mouth, and that facial hair, all gone slack.
He crumpled to the ground. Ormonde jumped aside just in time to avoid the man’s blade as it thrust awkwardly forward before dropping to the dirt.
And there stood Rollo. Tall, with eyes that were shadowed and lethally intent in the flickering torchlight. He was utter calm. Utter stillness.
His arm extended as if he’d just thrown a ball, or a dart. Or a knife.
Felicity’s eyes went to his
sgian dubh
, quivering deep in the man’s back.
She looked back up to find Rollo’s gaze devouring her. The flex of his jaw and the hard cast to his eyes were all that marred his outward calm.
Her heart soared. She knew what the set of that strong jaw meant. He’d come for her. He’d make this all go away.
My Viking will always come for me.
The surreal slow-motion unfolding of events exploded into rapid-fire action.
Ormonde squatting to retrieve his blade.
The cold press of steel on her throat, grown urgent.
Will, a shuffled step and a quick leap toward her. He led with his hands. Hands that grabbed the guardsman’s face. It was a savage gesture, without thought, like an animal pouncing, mauling his prey.
She pulled away, out from the path of Rollo’s feral leap. Away from her attacker’s knife.
The guardsman’s neck sounded a morbid crack, a hollow echo in the dank stone chamber. His fall, a dull thud.
Rollo went to Felicity at once. Wrapped her in his arms. His hands were all over her. He felt her face, her throat. The feel of him, solid against her, was like a homecoming.
Will, her home now.
Stroking her hair, he pulled her close, and then pushed back again, to ensure with his eyes what his hands had discerned. That she was unharmed.
“You came,” she cried. “I knew you’d come. I told him to watch out—that you’d come.”
“How could I not?” His hands stilled, cupped her cheeks. Rollo leaned in to kiss her tenderly. One chaste and lingering kiss on her mouth, still damp from her tears.
“I hate to interrupt you lovers, but I’d rather we make haste from here, before Robertson’s wee army of God discovers we’ve regained possession of his pretty prize witch.”
“Aye. Are you fine to travel?” Will asked her gently.
At her nod, he tucked her close. Her eyes widened.
“Where’s your cane?”
“I couldn’t very well climb down the ladder with it, could I?” He gave her a small smile.
“You came down to save me with nothing but that little knife in your sock?”
“A man has his hands too, aye?” He squeezed her waist, emphasizing his point.
She gave a startled laugh, and spied a flicker of joy on his face in response, as if only now it was hitting him that she was safe. That Robertson was dead.
“But you’re right,” Rollo said, turning to his friend. “We need to be away, and at once, before my brother comes sniffing about.” Lifting his arm, he said to Ormonde, “For once I’ll ask for your assistance, man.”
“Oh God be praised,” Ormonde said, rolling his eyes. He stepped to Rollo, offering his shoulder for the short walk across the chamber floor. “Finally. The man accepts help.”
“Don’t gloat,” Will told him, with a rare twinkle in his eye. “This will be the last thing I ask of you.”
“Indeed,” Ormonde said, growing serious. “From this moment on, you are the one who’ll be called upon. The Sealed Knot men don’t forget a debt.” He looked at the bodies littering the floor behind them, some complicated internal calculation knitting his brow. “And so it is here I must say good-bye to you. For now.”
They climbed back up the ladder, the red-haired man’s ominous words hanging in the air.
Chapter 24
“So . . .
cool
,” Felicity said, kicking at the edges of the dirt pathway. “You’re telling me the Romans marched right here? Like, along this very track?”
“Aye, along this very one.” Rollo stopped and turned, studying the path they’d just traversed. Some stretches were a deep and well-defined track, when all that was left of others was an eroded scar in the earth.
The Roman road was concealed by a dense thicket, which rose like a canopy around them, its mossy branches gnarled with age, dark and smelling of lush, rotted undergrowth, like some forest primeval. He’d had to slash their way in, edging carefully through and into the heart of what felt to Felicity like some long-slumbering dryad, vaguely malevolent and poised at any moment to creak into life, wrapping its woody claws around to seal them in forever.
“What you see is the ghost of the Roman Empire’s north ernmost border.”
“Did you have to say
ghost
?”
“Don’t fret, you.” Chucking her chin, Rollo gave a low laugh. “Though many know of the Roman fort in Kincladie Wood, few know this ancient road exists as well.”
“That just means they’ll never find us,” she said with dramatic gloom, chafing her arms and walking on.
“Afraid we’ll rouse the big Green Man from his slumber and he’ll come and eat us?”
She nodded nervously, an exaggerated frown of fear crinkling her features. “That’s almost exactly what I was thinking.”
“Fear not.” He wrapped his arm around her, hugging her close. “I shall protect you. I’m a valiant knight, remember?” Rollo kissed the top of her head. “And besides,” he added, patting his sporran, “there’s a reward for you at the end.”
“A reward?” she cooed, giving him a saucy wink.
He opened his mouth to speak, and then shut it again, growing somber.
It seemed to Felicity she’d just witnessed some inner light flickering, then winking out.
“Wait.” She stopped. “What’s the matter?”
“There’s naught that’s—”
“Don’t you
naught
me, William Rollo. You just thought something. Something not good, and I want to know what it was.”
“It’s only . . .”
“Only?” she demanded.
“It’s only that we cannot . . . We should not lie together again.”
“What?” She rounded on him. “That’s crazy talk. Why the hell not? You didn’t just save me from some deranged kidnapper only to . . . Wait.” She thought she knew what this was about. Her good, old-fashioned, noble Viking. “Is it that you think we should get married first, because—”
At the mention of marriage, she saw something in him die. She saw the despair, and she knew.
“You’re going to send me back, aren’t you?” she asked him quietly.
He gave her a silent, grim nod.
“You bastard.” She shoved him in the chest, and his eyes widened in surprise. “You are
not
going to send me back. I belong with
you
,” she said, stabbing a finger in his chest.
“I shouldn’t have compromised you so,” he said, his words so formal, she felt like she was being shut out. “I’d rather have you safe than—”
“Than have sex with me?” Felicity blurted. She grew still. “Are you saying we shouldn’t have done it the first time?”
He opened his mouth, but didn’t speak. Why wasn’t he saying anything?
Tears threatened, her voice reed-thin. “Are you saying you think this was a mistake?”
“Och, love. Never.” He canted his head, studying her as if for the last time. Such openness, such raw emotion was in his gaze, Felicity thought her heart would break from it. “I’ll never regret it. Never regret you. But . . . it’s too dangerous. I was a fool. You had me believing that you were sent back to me.
For
me. To be by my side.”
“But I was,” she said simply. “And now mister preacher man is dead. I’m safe. We’re getting away. Happily ever after, and all that jazz.”
“Your . . . happily ever after . . . can only come when you are safe. Here you are not, will never be, safe.” He took her shoulders. His hands were so gentle and strong, his eyes on her so intent, so earnest. And it was as though he’d begun to pull away already. “Aye, Robertson is dead, but his followers are not. These men . . . they’re like a great, ravenous beast that’s scented blood. They enjoy what they do, Felicity. Some of them truly believe you
are
a witch. They want to see you burn.”
“But . . .”
“No, love, let me finish.” The shadow of some distant pain pinched his features. “If that weren’t enough, there’s my brother to contend with. Robertson wasn’t in this alone. I see Jamie’s hand at work. My brother will not rest until he sees you ripped from my arms.”
They stared at each other in silence. Felicity’s mind refused to process what was happening.
“It would be too selfish of me,” he said finally. “Too great a risk. I’ll not see you in danger ever again. And so I must see you gone.”
Tears stung her eyes. Her throat clenched, from misery, from frustration, from desperation. She had to convince him she needed to stay. He was her hero, her Viking. He could protect her. She would
show
him she needed to stay.
“Screw that, William Rollo.” Her voice was a fierce growl.
She leapt for him, and Rollo stumbled backwards. His cane clattered to the dirt as he caught her, supported her. She wrapped her legs around him, kissing him, tangling her fingers wildly in his thick, soft, chestnut hair.
It took him only a moment to start kissing her back, and she knew a brief flicker of triumph. She felt his moans hum through her, but whether they were sounds of pleasure or anguish, Felicity wasn’t sure.
She craved him, completely. Wanted to take him in, feel his breath in her lungs. To feel him inside her, to feel Rollo spill himself, inside her.
Then, surely, he’d realize.
She pulled from him, cradled his face in her hands. Her voice was the barest whisper. “Please, Will. I want you. Just one more time.”
She felt him between her legs, hard and wanting her in return, and she knew she had him. She’d convince him she could handle the past, and he’d want one more, and one more, and one more again.
“Lay me down, Will.” Felicity trailed slow kisses along his face, his neck. “Lay down with me.”
She unhooked her legs from around his waist. Nestling the hard length of him between her thighs, she did a slow slide down the front of his body to the ground.
“We shouldn’t . . .” he said raggedly. “I must remain alert. I vowed I’d see you back safe.”
“What better way to keep me safe than to lay right on top of me?” She tugged at his arms, beckoning him down to the ground.
The forest floor was cool and soft, a rich, mossy loam that gave with their weight. Light filtered in through the knotted thicket overhead, and what had seemed a malignant wood spirit now felt natural, some primitive homecoming, dirt and sex and trees.
He lay on his side facing her, his face a map of pain and longing.
“Don’t think,” she whispered to him. “Just be. Let go, Will. You’ll most regret the thing you don’t do, not the thing you do.”
She traced her fingertip lightly along his features. The strong edges of jaw and cheekbone, his aristocratic brow and nose.
“Don’t you want me?” Her soft voice mingled with the rustles and sighs of the forest around them.
“How could you even think I’d not want you?” he asked hoarsely. Will put his hand on hers, stilling it. He turned his head to kiss her palm. “Wanting you is all I’ve been doing since the first day I laid eyes on you.”
“And so you have me.” Putting her hands on his shoulders, she guided him onto his back and swung a leg over to straddle him. He nestled between her legs, hard already, and the feel of it flashed her back to their first time.
Him, familiar, a body already known by her own, as readily recognized as his heart. Her chest crackled with the joy of it.
He watched her, watched this glorious creature climb onto him for the second time in his life, not knowing how it could be that he was worthy of such a thing. Elation and grief collided in his heart with an ache rivaled only by the one between his legs.
Will reached up to unlace her. She stopped him, giving him a single slow, mute shake of her head.
With a seductive arch of her back, Felicity reached behind to undo her own laces. She was careful and silent, her eyes not shifting from his. Her hair slipped through her gown as she raised it over her head, falling in a heavy spill over her shoulders and breasts.
Compelled to touch it, to touch her, he brushed his knuckle lightly over a swath of that hair, thick yellow silk over her hardened nipple.
She inhaled sharply, and his eyes shot back to hers. They both remained silent, this moment a fragile thing, charged already with the pain of good-bye.
She was naked now, and Will clothed, and looking up at her, the watery sunlight illuminating her from above, he could almost believe she was the fairy princess he’d mused about when he’d had his first sight of her.
Felicity reached down, began to carefully undress him, and this time he let her. Her concentration, those graceful and precise movements, stabbed him with an anguish that stole the breath from his chest.
Finally he felt her skin on his, and he shut his eyes, overwhelmed by it all. His desire, his pain, both drowning him.