Creole Fires (25 page)

“Thank God,” she whispered, breathing a sigh of relief.

The hard wooden seat had bruised her bottom, the bone-jarring wagon had strained every muscle and joint. Drawing rein on old Zeke, she set the brake, climbed down from the seat, and tried to work the kinks from her back and shoulders.

Inside the tavern, she could hear men’s voices and the sound of a piano being played just a little off-key.

“Need some help, missus?” A small black boy approached from around the corner of the building.

“Yes, if you please. My horse needs care. See that he gets some oats and a manger of hay.”

“Yes’m,” the boy said.

He led old Zeke toward the barn at the rear while Nicki headed up the brick steps and pulled open the heavy plank door. The tavern was low-ceilinged, with huge hand-carved beams overhead and ironwork covering the windows. It looked Spanish in design, though the interior had been bastardized by its owners and years of abuse.

“You are looking for someone?” the innkeeper asked, eyeing her from top to bottom. His accent was French, but much more pronounced than Alex’s.

“I’m supposed to meet my husband. Donovan St. Michaels.” It was as good a story as any.

“I am afraid ‘e is not ’ere.” The innkeeper was a big man, with thick black hair worn far too long, beefy shoulders and hands, and a heavy black beard.

“Well, he will be,” she told him. “In the meantime, I’ll need a room.”

“You intend to stay ’ere alone?”

“I told you, my husband is due at any moment.”

“Oui
, that is what you said.” He wiped his large hands on the front of the towel tucked into his heavy
leather apron. “His name is
Donovan
St. Michaels, yes?”

“Yes.”

“That is what I thought. When ‘e arrives, I will send ‘im up.”

“I’d appreciate that.”

“You must pay in advance.”

“Of course,” she agreed as if she had known that all along. Digging into her carpetbag, she pulled out a small leather pouch full of coins. “I’ll need something to eat, as well. And the boy outside is feeding my horse.”

He grunted an acknowledgment and told her the amount he would need, which again seemed far too high. Nicki felt too tired to argue. Besides, the tavern was full of men, most of whom had noticed her entry and now sat watching her. Several made whispered remarks, pointed in her direction, and laughed lewdly at their own private jokes. Two tavern wenches worked the room, busily filling tankards of ale or goblets of wine.

Following the Frenchman up the stairs, she heard the bell above the door jingle just as she reached the top. Below her, a red-haired man in a dusty dragoon uniform stepped into the room. Paying him little heed, Nicki waited for the tavern keeper to open the door.

“Back stairs lead to the privy,” he told her.

“Thank you.” At least she wouldn’t have go out through the tavern.

Once inside the tiny room, she arched a brow, surprised to find it clean and neat, though Spartan. The bed was little more than a moss-filled mattress covering the slats beneath, but the blankets looked warm
and clean. A scarred oak bureau rested against one wall beneath a tiny mirror. A pitcher and basin stood ready and waiting for her use. No fire warmed the hearth, but it wasn’t really that cold.

Unable to undress until her food arrived, Nicki tossed her sachel onto the bed and began to unbraid her hair. Using the silver-handled brush she had taken from her room at Belle Chêne, the one luxury she’d allowed herself, she brushed the long, rippling strands until they gleamed in the light from the whale oil lamp beside the bed.

A knock at the door came just as she finished. A big-bosomed serving maid brought in a tray of food and set it on the bureau. “Thank you,” Nicki said, giving her a smile for her trouble instead of money she couldn’t afford. The aroma of crusty bread and thick beef stew made her mouth water.

She would eat first, then get out of her dusty clothes. As tired as she was, with a full stomach and a goblet of wine, she felt sure she’d be able to sleep.

The young red-haired dragoon pulled up a chair and banged on the oak plank table. “Fetch me some rum, wench, and be quick about it.” The maid did as he asked, and he downed the drink in one long swallow. “Fill it again,” he demanded, but his grin looked broad and he gave her a lusty slap on the rump. The broad-hipped maid giggled and danced away.

Any other night, Septimus K. Watkins would have thought her comely enough for a toss between the blankets, but not tonight. He had just been promoted. He intended to celebrate, drink himself blind, then buy himself the lustiest wench in the tavern.

“What be yer name, boy?” A balding, one-eyed
man with the look of a sailor sat down on the bench across from him.

“Sep Watkins.” He extended one lean hand.

“A fine name for a fine fightin’ man.” The sailor accepted the handshake. “Sargeant, is it?”

“Corporal. As of today.”

“Wheelock Upton’s me name.” The sailor slapped Sep on the back, then turned to the wench, who stood near his shoulder. “Buy the lad a drink,” he said with a grin, “and bring another for me while you’re about it.”

An hour later, the sailor heeled over the table, well into his cups and singing a lusty sea song, Sep felt just fine. A little drunk, to be sure, but not so much he wouldn’t enjoy his wench. Making his way toward the oak plank bar where the innkeeper worked tapping a keg, he drew the big man aside.

“I want the finest wench in the tavern.”

“That would be Desiree,” the Frenchman said, pointing to the broad-hipped maid who’d been serving him all evening.

Sep shook his head. “Not tonight. I’ve a pocket full of coins and a belly full of rum. It’s something special I’m after.” He jangled his purse on the bar.

The innkeeper stroked his beard. “I ‘ave something special,” he said with a glance toward the stairs. “But she is expensive.”

“Tonight, I will pay.”

“This one has hair the color of copper,” he said, warming to his subject, “a waist sooo small”—he made a tiny circle with his hands—“and eyes like an aqua sea.”

Sep smiled his approval, but the innkeeper shrugged it away.

“Then again, you might not want ’er. You see, she likes a man who is, ’ow do you say? Rough. A man who will take ’er against ’er most vehement protests. Show ’er ’e is really a man,
comprenez-vous?”

The corporal puffed his chest out. “I’ll give her a tumble she won’t soon forget.”

“You are sure?”

“She’ll know a man’s had her when I’m finished.”

The innkeeper slapped him on the back. “Let me see the color of your money, m’sieur. It seems we will do business.”

As the Frenchman promised, when Sep used the key to open the door, he sucked in a breath at the sleeping girl’s beauty. For a moment he just stood in the doorway and watched her, holding his lamp high, enjoying the way her bright copper hair fanned out across her pillow.

Her eyes were closed, but a thick sweep of dark auburn lashes fanned over her cheeks, and her mouth was lush and a tantalizing shade of pink. She wore a simple white nightgown, but the thin material did little to disguise the rise and fall of her full, round breasts. Sep felt himself harden.

Stepping into the room, he closed the door and set the lamp on the dresser, where its soft light flickered across the sleeping figure. Silently and with great anticipation, he stripped off his sword, pulled off his heavy black boots, and unfastened the brass buttons on his uniform. Next went his long red underwear, leaving him naked, his body lean and toughened from his months in the service of his country.

Moving toward the bed, he eased himself down beside her, not certain what to expect. Still, she did not move.

With a shaky hand, Sep ran his fingers over her breasts, unbuttoned the front of her nightgown, and slipped his hand inside. At the contact with her smooth white skin, the nipple that pebbled beneath his palm, Sep’s arousal hardened even more. He was aching to get inside her, dying to see what lay beneath the white cotton fabric.

Leaning down, he brushed her lips with a soft, sweet kiss and she sighed. Then her eye fluttered open, the most enchanting aqua hue he’d ever seen.

“Alex?” she whispered, and he wondered who the lucky man was.

With her lips parted as they were, the temptation to kiss her again became unbearable. Sep covered her mouth with his and forced his tongue inside. He heard her startled gasp just before her fingers gripped his bright red hair and her teeth sank into his tongue.

“Ouch!” he yelled, pulling away from her, his tongue beginning to bleed. Quickly he pinned her wrists while using his body to hold her in place beneath him.

“Get out of my room!” she yelled, trying to sit up but firmly held down by his hands and his body.

Sep only smiled. He was ready for this encounter. He was hard and aching—and he had been given fair warning. “I’ll give you the ride of your life, sweet lady. You may struggle, or you may go easy. Either way, I shall have you.”

“Nooo!” she shrieked, but he silenced her with his lips.

Nicki scratched and clawed, thrashed her arms and legs, twisted and pulled and tried to break free. She could feel the man’s stiff member pressing
against her thighs as he fought to settle himself between her legs. Though she valiantly struggled against him, her thrashing movements only managed to slide up her thin cotton nightgown and ensnare them both in the long copper strands of her hair. When she tried to bite him again, he used one hand to pin both her wrists, and covered her mouth with the other.

“I shall have you, lady. You shall know the touch of a virile man this night.”

Clamping her legs together, Nicki forced herself to stay calm. Traver Preston’s pistol was still in her carpetbag, lying just few feet away. If she could free herself, she could reach it.

If
had never seemed a more uncertain word.

“May I be of ’elp, m’sieur?”

Alex answered the innkeeper in his native French. “I’m looking for a woman. Small. Hair the color of copper. Her eyes are aqua.”

“You are her husband?” the Frenchman asked, obviously disconcerted. “You are Donovan St. Michaels?”

Alex smiled inwardly as he pieced together her ruse. “Then my wife is here?” he pressed, letting the man assume what he would.

“Yes, but …”

“But what? Which room is she in? I’ll need a key.”

The Frenchman looked worried. “I have some very bad news, m’sieur.” His eyes flicked nervously back and forth, and he stroked his heavy black beard. “It seems your wife is upstairs with her lover. Apparently she did not expect you so soon.”

“Her lover?” He had been holding his anger in check. Now it rolled over him like a wave. “You mean to tell me she’s upstairs with a man?”

“Oui
, m’sieur.”

“Give me the key.”

“I think it would be best if you went back home and waited for her there.”

“Now.”

The innkeeper handed him a key. “It is the room at the end of the hallway, but I am warning you, the man who is with her—he is a soldier.”

Alex didn’t bother to answer—just took the stairs two at a time, strode down the hall, and unlocked the door. When he pushed it open, he found Nicki lying beneath a naked red-haired man, her nightshirt open to the waist and her breasts exposed. The gown rode up her thighs, revealing her shapely legs. Alex’s fury in that moment was so great it took a full five seconds for him to realize she was struggling, her fingers clutching her carpetbag, which she dragged toward her across the floor.

“I ought to leave you to him!” he roared, but instead reached for the back of the man’s neck, clamped the nape in a grip of iron, and pulled him away as if he were only a boy.

“What the …? The words died on the stunned man’s lips.

Alex drove a fist into the dragoon’s midsection, doubling him over, then punched him hard in the jaw. Nicki screamed when the man slammed into the bureau, shoving it into the middle of the room and nearly toppling the lamp. Two more bone-crashing blows had blood oozing from the soldier’s broken nose and trickling from a swollen lip.

“If you want her that bad, you can have her,” the dragoon choked out as Alex dragged him up by the hair. “She’s already paid for.”

Alex stopped his fist in mid-swing. “Paid for? What are you talking about?”

“I said you can have her.”

“Who did you pay?”

“The Frenchman,” he gasped out. “Twenty dollars. All the gold in my purse.”

Alex swore soundly.

“Frenchman said she liked it rough. That she wanted her skirts tossed by a real man.”

Alex let go of the man’s hair, and he sagged to the floor. “Get out.”

The corporal grabbed his uniform in one hand, his boots in the other, and staggered to his feet. Naked, he stumbled out the door.

Coming to her knees on the bed, her hair swirling wildly around her, Nicki held her tattered nightshirt together in an effort to cover her breasts.

Nom de Dieu
—he had been right! Thank God he arrived when he did. Damn her stubborn little hide, she needed his protection. It infuriated him that she refused to listen. A muscle bunched in Alex’s cheek. Somehow, some way, he had to make her see!