Gabriel held up a hand to signal Amelia and Mora to
stop. He listened, his gaze scanning the trees surrounding them as he tried to identify the sound. There it was again. A creak. A wheel? There was obviously some sort of conveyance coming down the road a few yards to their left. He had decided they would not use the road. If they were being hunted, and he was certain they were, the road would be the logical place to look for them.
“Why are we stopping?” Amelia whispered behind him.
“Someone is coming,” he answered. “We'll move closer to the road and watch.”
“I don't hear anything,” she said after a moment's pause.
He gave her a look that usually silenced whoever thought to annoy him by babbling at the mouth. As he suspected, it didn't work on her.
“Well, I don't,” she huffed.
Gabriel motioned them forward. The vegetation grew thicker as they approached the road. The brambles and branches caught at their clothing and hair. At
least at his and Amelia's hair. Mora was wise to have worn her bonnet. He expected Amelia to complain, but she did not, if her expression told him easily enough that she was displeased.
Her stomach grumbled and he knew he should have forced her to eat raw fish that morning. She had actually gagged and carried on so that he had relented in the end and allowed her to go without eating. She had to be starving. Hell, he was starving and he had managed to make himself eat raw fish.
Once the road came into view, Gabriel found a place for them to crouch and hide. He didn't suppose he was lucky enough for whoever it was coming down the road to be one of his brothers, he hoped recently returned from London.
“Where are they?” Amelia whispered beside him. “I can clearly see down the road and I see no one.”
His hearing was superior to hers. But he couldn't explain that to her, not without making her as fearful of him as she was of the creatures that hunted them.
“Patience is a virtue,” he remarked.
“I care little about being virtuous,” she countered. “I'd rather have a ride to Wulfglen, a nice hot bath, a fresh change of clothes, and a full stomach.”
She had him there. Her sauciness made him smile, and Gabriel wasn't used to being so easily entertained. Amelia's very nearness stirred him to lust. He had kissed her twice, and he wanted very badly to do it again. His thoughts should not be on what he'd like to do to Lady Collingsworth but focused upon their situation and how to best keep both women alive and from harm's way.
They sat in silence. Mora's stomach grumbled and Gabriel wondered what they would do for food. He could easily catch something, but they would be foolish to build a fire. It would lead those looking for them right to them. He'd gotten the women safely from the house, but without food and shelter, how much longer could he keep them safe?
Finally a cart being pulled by a man, another walking by his side, came into view. Both men looked like peasants. One walked with a cane; a stick really was all it was. Neither man was particularly big. Gabriel saw no visible signs of weapons, which he knew meant nothing. They looked harmless enough ⦠but looks were often deceiving.
“There they are,” Amelia whispered, her eyesight only now able to make out the cart and the two men. “Do you think they might help us?”
“They have no horses,” he said, disappointed. “I doubt they have anything to spare. I can't see where they could help us. Best to just let them move on past.”
“Not help us?” she echoed, her big blue eyes widening. “Why wouldn't they help us? Three men are better than only one when it comes to protection. We could offer to pay them if they accompany us to Wulfglen.”
She had a twig in her hair and he loosened it for her. “We would have to tell them what we are running from,” he pointed out. “I imagine they would think we are all mad, don't you?”
“'Spect if they are from around these parts, they might not be so surprised,” Mora offered. “And they are peasant folk, which is plain to see. They've probably
grown up on the same stories I grew up on. They believe in strange tales easier than most.”
“Maybe they at least have some food they could spare,” Amelia piped up. “Anything. I promise I won't complain.”
The hope in her eyes was his undoing. She was hungry, Mora was hungry, and Gabriel felt incompetent to take care of them properly. He'd never had to take care of anyone but his younger brother before. Certainly not two females. Gabriel had a few coins in the purse stuffed inside his pocket. When he'd set out to search for Jackson, he'd never imagined it would take him as long as it had or be as expensive.
“All right,” he agreed. “But I go alone. You two stay here in the brush, hidden. Understood?”
The women nodded and he rose from his crouching position, his thigh aching from all the pushing he'd done last night and earlier today. He'd pulled Mora's stitches open, but he wouldn't tell her. They had worse things to worry about.
Gabriel walked out on the road and started toward the men. They drew up when they saw him, looking wary as he approached. He let his hands hang down by his sides so they could see he wasn't armed, if the pistol still rested in the waistband of his trousers beneath his shirt.
“Good afternoon,” he called.
Neither man spoke, but neither did they suddenly draw weapons, so Gabriel continued toward them.
“I've had a mishap,” he called. “My horse threw me and I've been walking for two days. I wondered if you could spare any food?”
Both men looked at each other. “Can you pay?” one called.
“I have a little, not much,” he answered. He probably had more than these two would see in a year's wages, but only a fool would let that fact be known. It wasn't that Gabriel couldn't take both men if they tried anything, but he didn't want to fight in front of the women if it could be avoided.
“How much you got?” one of the men asked when he drew closer.
“That would depend on what you have to spare,” Gabriel answered.
Both men walked to the back of the cart. “Taking supplies to our families,” one said. “Otherwise we wouldn't have much. But if you've got coin to pay for what you take, I suppose we can replace it easy enough.”
Gabriel might have been relieved, but he didn't plan to let his guard down until an exchange was made and the men were out of eyesight. They threw a tattered canvas back and displayed their supplies. There was more in the cart than he would have suspected.
“Got big families,” one of the men grumbled. “Break our backs to feed them all.”
Most of the supplies Gabriel couldn't use. Flour, sugar, things for baking that would do them little good. “I need something to tide me over until I reach my home,” he specified. “Do you have dried beef? Bread? Cider?”
“Where might your home be?” one of the men asked.
Gabriel wasn't about to tell them. Most had heard of the Wulf brothers. If the scandal attached to their
names didn't make the men shy away, the wealth attached to the name would make them greedy.
“Three or four days out maybe,” was all he provided. “Never walked it before, so I'm not certain how much longer.”
“All alone, are you?” one man asked, his gaze scanning the area.
Gabriel's senses went on the alert. “Yes,” he answered.
“Not a good thing,” the other said, smiling at him. “These roads are dangerous for a lone man.”
“Especially one turned out as fine as you are,” the other added. “Plain to see you're not of the working class. A London dandy would fare worse than most on the road alone.”
Both men chuckled. Gabriel smiled pleasantly at them. Let them think him a dandy. He glanced down at the supplies again. While he busied himself looking over the fare, he fully expected one, if not both men to try something. He made an easy target in their eyes despite his size. They wouldn't expect he'd know how to defend himself. They were in for a surprise.
“Gabriel! Watch out!”
He glanced up to see Amelia standing in the road. Because of the distraction, he wasn't ready for the blow when it came. The man with the stick hit Gabriel across the shoulders, aiming for his head, he suspected, but not tall enough to reach. The blow staggered him. The man might be short, but he had strength.
“Didn't tell us you had company,” the other man taunted Gabriel. “Now she's a sight for sore eyes, that one.”
“Pretty,” the man with the stick said, then swung.
Gabriel ducked the blow, which was again aimed at his head. He'd once told his brother Armond that the rules of society no longer applied to a family shunned by the ton. Manners were something Gabriel had forsaken some time back, and still, it bothered him to fight in front of Amelia. Gentlemen did not subject genteelbred ladies to such vulgarity, or so he'd once been taught.
“Hey, there's another one. One for you and one for me,” the man with the stick chirped.
Mora must have joined Amelia on the road. Gabriel used the distraction of the women to his advantage, stepping forward to grab the man's stick. He brought it up and smacked the man hard in the face. The force broke his nose, and blood spurted down his face.
“Hey!” the other man bellowed.
Gabriel stepped forward and delivered him a sound punch that sent him reeling backward. The man with the bloody face charged Gabriel. They landed in the dusty road. Gabriel hardly fought by Oxford rules. He rolled, gained his feet, and kicked the man in the ribs. The man grunted and drew his knees up to his chest. Gabriel paused long enough to push his hair out of his face and wipe his sleeve across his bloody lip. He was attacked from the back.
The other man had retrieved his friend's stick and clearly intended to beat Gabriel senseless with it. He took one blow to the back. The stick landed hard on his injured shoulder and he stifled a groan.
Wheeling to face the man, Gabriel was shocked when he saw Amelia jump on the man from behind.
The man bellowed and easily threw her lighter weight off of him. Then he shoved her and she landed hard in the dirt. Gabriel saw red.
He charged the man and easily wrestled the stick from him. His temper simmering, Gabriel broke the stick in half. The man's eyes nearly bulged from his head.
“We don't hit girls,” Gabriel said, very low, nearly a growl. “Didn't your parents teach you that?”
Rather than answer, the man scrambled away, turned tail, and ran in the opposite direction.
“Wait,” the other one yelled, staggering to his feet. He ran after his partner.
Rushing to Amelia's side, Gabriel helped her to rise. “Are you hurt?” he asked.
She shook her head. “He just knocked the breath from me for a moment.”
Gabriel sighed with relief. Then he got angry. “What were you thinking? I told you to stay put.”
Her hair had come loose from the braid Mora had fixed for her before they set out that morning. Wispy blond curls framed her dirt-streaked face, and still she managed to look like a princess. Amelia placed her hands upon her hips. “I thought you needed help,” she answered. Her gaze suddenly landed upon the broken stick lying on the ground. “I guess I was wrong.” Her big blue eyes lifted to him. “How did you break that in half? I've never seen a man do anything like that before!”
Gabriel had let his temper get the best of him. It wasn't something he should do in front of normal folk, like Amelia. Rather than answer her, he glanced down the road toward Mora. “Come, Mora,” he called. “Pick out supplies for us. You'll know best what we need.”
The girl started toward them.
“You didn't answer me,” Amelia reminded him. “How could you possibly break a stick that thick in half as if it were no more than a twig?”
He couldn't explain his unusual strength any better than his unusual eyesight or his superior hearing. But Gabriel knew he must offer her some type of explanation. “Have you seen men brawl before, Amelia?”
She frowned up at him. “Well, no, never, but still ⦔
Gabriel moved to the back of the wagon with Mora. “Rage gives a man strength he might not otherwise have. The fool was lucky I didn't snap his neck as easily as I snapped the stick. He shouldn't have touched you.”
“Sent those two running,” Mora remarked as she sorted through supplies. “Thought fancy men fought with fancy manners.” She eyed him oddly beneath her lashes and Gabriel thought it best to turn both women's attention toward something other than his fighting skills.
“What do we need here?” he asked the girl.
Mora had separated a few items from the rest. “Jerky doesn't have to be cooked,” she said. “Two loaves of bread. Some cheese. Apples. A jug of cider for when we can't find water easily.”