The Prince Kidnaps a Bride (21 page)

She had to stay alive.

“Sorcha!” the stranger’s voice called again. “Let me help you.”

Who was it?

“Let me help you again.”

She broke out of the trees. She heard the thrashing behind her as the rider broke free, too.

Stay alive.

And that required bold action. Using all her skill, she turned Conquest in a sharp circle and galloped right at her pursuer.

She saw a huge bald man on a gigantic horse. His features were battered. His pale eyes were narrowed. He wore a sword and a dagger.

“Godfrey!” She recognized him now.

Godfrey was Grandmamma’s trusted emissary and bodyguard, the man who’d taken Sorcha from her sanctuary in England to the convent in Scotland, the man she thought protected her from harm—and he pointed his pistol at her.

“Whoreson!” she shrieked in fury. She stared with narrowed eyes right at him. How dare he? How dare he point that at her? How dare he threaten her with harm?

His pistol wavered. He fired. He missed.

She whipped past him at close range and back into the trees. She could see someone racing straight at her. Two somebodies.

Rainger, galloping with all his might. And another whoreson right on his tail.

At the sight of her careening toward him, the second whoreson grinned a black-toothed grin. He lifted his musket, aimed at her—

And Rainger turned in his saddle and blasted him with a shot from his pistol.

Blood blossomed in his chest and he blew backward off his horse.

Once again Rainger turned forward. But too late.

Godfrey dashed toward him, sword upraised.

Just in time, Rainger caught a glimpse of the steel. He leaped out of the saddle. He hit the ground on his back.

Godfrey’s blow whistled in the air where Rainger had been.

Alanjay galloped away.

Godfrey turned his horse back toward Rainger, intent on his prey, riding as hard as he could.

Rainger was motionless. Winded? Or dead?

Not dead. Please, not dead.

Godfrey’s gaze never wavered from Rainger’s body.

She saw the outstretched branch.

Godfrey did not.

She shrieked his name. “Godfrey!”

At the sound of her voice, he turned—and the fat branch knocked him out of the saddle.

The branch cracked under the impact. She gasped with relief and prayed that Rainger would rise.

Even on the ground, Godfrey was formidable, but she still had Conquest beneath her, and for Rainger, Sorcha and her horse wouldn’t hesitate to stomp Godfrey into the ground.

Then, thank God, Rainger stirred. He was alive. He shook his head, rolled to his feet. With a glance he assessed the situation, and while Godfrey gasped for breath, he charged. He leaped on him. He slammed a fist under his chin.

Godfrey’s head snapped back. He twisted like a dervish.

Sorcha saw the glint of a knife in his hand. “Look, Rainger!” Foolish to yell a warning—but she already knew she was a fool.

Rainger grabbed Godfrey’s arm. The men wrestled, straining, muscles bulging.

Grandmamma had chosen Godfrey for his strength. He was hulking, so much larger than Rainger.

Sorcha couldn’t sit here on Conquest and watch the struggle. She looked around for a weapon.

The branch. She grabbed the end, leaned with all her weight, and broke it free. She rode toward the grappling men, lifted the branch over Godfrey’s head—and the men rolled.

Rainger was on top.

Sorcha could do nothing.

Without warning, the knife disappeared. She heard a bubbling gasp and realized—one of the men had been stabbed.

Bounding out of the saddle, she ran toward them.

Rainger staggered to his feet, blood on his hands and shirt. He looked down at Godfrey.

The knife blade was buried in Godfrey’s chest.

She stopped, her relief so great she swayed. Rainger was alive. That was all that mattered. Rainger was alive.

He glanced at her. “All right?”

“Yes. Just... yes.”

Kneeling beside the thrashing Godfrey, Rainger leaned over him. “Did Count duBelle hire you?”

Godfrey laughed, a gasping sound. “Years ago.”

“Why?” Sorcha rushed to his side. “Why would you betray Grandmamma?”

“For money. Isn’t that always the reason, Godfrey?” Rainger stood and whistled, calling in Alanjay and Conquest.

“He said... he said... why would I work for a woman when I could work for him?” Godfrey spasmed with pain.

Sorcha touched his shoulder. “No man is tougher than my grandmother.”

“Not me.” Godfrey’s breath rattled in his lungs.

Rainger looped the reins of their two horses over a branch. He looked around alertly, and she knew he stood ready to snatch her up and run at a moment’s notice.

But she hated to leave even Godfrey alone to die.

“You... you princesses were such sweet girls, pretty and soft,” he murmured. “Nice to me.”

“Yes.” Sorcha and her sisters
had
been nice to Godfrey. They felt sorry for him because he had to work for Grandmamma.

“I couldn’t bear to kill you.” Godfrey tried to inhale, but he coughed instead. “So I sent you away... where no one could find you. And
he
found out—”

Rainger glanced around at the mayhem in the small grove. “Godfrey!” he said in a loud voice. “How many more assassins are there?”

Godfrey didn’t seem to hear him. His eyes had turned glassy and he stared at Sorcha as if he couldn’t look away. “When I shot at you, you were angry.”

“But your pistol wavered.”

“After all these years... still couldn’t kill you.” Blood trickled from Godfrey’s lips. “When you’re angry, you look... like your grandmother.”

The thunder of hooves shook the ground.

Rainger looked up the road, then said urgently, “Godfrey! How big is the reward to kill us?”

Godfrey was drifting into another world, and only Sorcha kept his attention. “When he found out you... were alive, he gave me one... last chance. He thought since you knew me I could get you... but I still couldn’t do it.”

Rainger reached for Sorcha to bring her to her feet and take her away. Then they heard the shout. He relaxed. “It’s the men from New Prospera. We’ll be safe... for now. We’ll ride for Edinburgh and home as quickly as possible.”

Still in that dreamy voice, Godfrey said, “No matter how much it cost me, I couldn’t... kill you. But I could have killed
him
.” His gaze slid to Rainger. Abruptly, reason returned to his clouded blue eyes. “The reward is a thousand gold guineas, Your Highness. You figure out how many men are after you.”

Running toward the road, Rainger flagged down the villagers.

Godfrey whispered, “Tell Queen Claudia... in the end, I didn’t betray her.”

S
orcha stood on the deck of the
Luella Josephine
as it cut through the water toward Southern France. The voyage would take less than two days and, she hoped, leave their assassins in the dust.

Yet Godfrey was dead.

Alroy was wounded.

On the road to Edinburgh, the men of New Prospera had had to fight off three more attacks. They had ridden through the night, and when at last the party reached the ship, the villagers had taken Alanjay and Conquest and promised Sorcha they would be well loved.

Then Rainger and Sorcha had boarded and waited, nerves stretched thin, until the ship sailed on the tide.

But at last she was on her way home—on her way home with a man she knew so well, yet barely knew.

She ignored the prickling sensation at the base of her neck. She wanted to watch the shoreline of Scotland disappear over the horizon into the morning mist, and she did. Yet all the while, she was aware that Rainger stood on the deck above, dressed in black, scrutinizing her with his dark gaze.

Who did he see standing by the rail? She wasn’t the same girl she’d been when she’d been forced from Beaumontagne. She wasn’t even the same woman who’d left the convent. But yesterday, when she saw Rainger on the ground and believed him unconscious and possibly dead, she had learned something very important.

It didn’t matter that he’d made a fool of her or that he’d burned her sisters’ letters. Arnou or Rainger, she still loved him—which made her a bigger fool than ever.

But she needed to talk to him. Really talk to him, and explain how she felt and who she was.

He would want that, too. For their marriage to survive, he would have to understand her pride as she understood his.

And at last she responded to his unspoken demand, turned and looked up at him. He leaned against the rail, his hands folded before him, his dark gaze fixed on her. It seemed as if he summoned her across space, demanding she submit to him.

That was wrong. She was a princess—and not just any princess, the crown princess, a woman destined to be a queen. She did not submit, not to him, not to anyone. Yet they could have a marriage of mutual partnership. She would tell him, and he would listen. He was a reasonable man. Or at least—Arnou had been a reasonable man.

All she could see now was open water. The wind blew the sails full and whipped her straw bonnet off her head. Only the ribbons tied around her chin kept it from blowing away. Catching the brim, she moved toward the cabin, knowing full well Rainger would follow and follow soon, for like flint and spark they ignited each other.

Their cramped cabin held a narrow bed with a straw mattress, a small round table with two chairs and a lit lantern swinging on a hook. Rainger had paid dearly for this booking, and for that reason the captain had ignored the fact that they had no chest, no clothes, no linens, and he had provided bedclothes and blankets to keep them warm.

Removing her battered bonnet and cloak, she hung them on hooks against the wall. She hesitated with her hand on the breeches she wore beneath her skirt. She’d grown used to wearing them. She liked them. No—she loved them. No wonder men wore them. They provided a protection skirts and petticoats never could. For her, they bestowed freedom of a sort she’d never imagined. Clad in her breeches, she’d sung in a tavern, she’d visited ladies of the night, she’d bartered with a horse trader, and she’d loved every minute of it.

But she had to return to being a woman and a princess, and that meant discarding the trappings of a boy.

So she did. She removed her shoes and her breeches. Yet... in light of Rainger’s brooding gaze, she wondered if she’d made a wise decision... .

She changed her mind. Standing, she grabbed her breeches, lifted her skirt, stepped one foot in the leg—and the door opened.

“While you’re at it, take off everything.”

At the sound of Rainger’s rough command, she stumbled backward and fell into the seat.

He shut and locked the door behind him. His menacing gaze had not lightened.

She smiled at him anyway. “I was putting them on.”

“Why?”

Because you’re looking at me as if you’re a wolf and I’m a tasty rabbit.
And she didn’t like being a rabbit.

Carefully she freed her foot. Agreeably she said, “If there’s one thing I learned today, it’s that we need to talk, and although we’ve been married only a day, I already know we won’t talk if I take off all my clothes.”

“That’s funny.” He leaned against the door and removed his boots. “If there’s one thing I’ve learned since I met you, it’s that talking is overrated.” Unbuttoning his trousers, he dropped them and his underdrawers in a single motion.

“It’s easy to tell what your purpose is.” With his cock at full attention, how could she doubt it? Standing, she brushed her hands at her gown. “But before things spin out of control, Rainger, I’d like to say that what happened today was—”

Without finesse, without warning, he stepped over to her, shoved her skirt up, and lifted her off her feet. He wrapped her legs around his hips and held her with his arm under her bottom.

Their bare parts met and she jumped from shock. He burned her with his heat and when she looked into his eyes, she saw why. He was furious. He was tense. He was anguished.

Anguished? But why?

“Today I thought you were dead.”

“Since I’m the last princess left to you, I can see that would be upsetting.” She held her breath, waiting for him to deny it.

“When I saw that shot in the grove, I imagined... the worst.” His chest heaved. He backed her toward the wall.

The wood was hard and chilly through her clothes. “I thought you were dead, too.” She shivered as she remembered the sight of his body landing hard on the ground, the horse galloping away, and Godfrey charging.

“Yes. We both came too close. Never again.” Rainger’s fingers clenched her thighs. “I am never going to fear like that again.”

Talking. Yes, they were talking. Unfortunately, he was also rubbing himself against her. She shifted, trying to get away, and discovered the friction felt good in any spot.

“When Godfrey was on the ground, you should have run away,” Rainger said.

“You’re not making sense. I was safer close to you.” She was wide open and vulnerable to him and he was making her ache with need. “Safer there than chasing down the road and running into the next group of assassins.”

“You should have hidden.”

“But I couldn’t allow Godfrey to kill you.”

“I can take care of myself.”

Rainger spoke so abruptly, so harshly, she flinched. That sounded as if he was rejecting her. Rejecting her help.

Yet over and over, he ground his erection into her sensitive tissues, pinning her between him and the wall, pinning her between desire and the yearning to communicate. Her words came in tiny gasps. She could scarcely speak in sentences. “I almost saw you... killed today, too, and that’s why I say we need to... talk.” Her breasts were tightening to the point of painfulness. Her loins were warming and growing moist. “Oh, please, Rainger, talk to me.”

“I have a better idea.” His voice was guttural. With his hand under her bottom, he adjusted himself, found the entrance to her body, and worked his way inside.

The sensation caught her by surprise. This was not the long, drawn-out, tender possession of their wedding night. Tonight he seemed larger, stretching her, moving on her, making her whimper in frightened anticipation. This was hot and desperate and needy, an act to be done in a hurry. He was on fire and the blaze communicated itself to her.

She tried to move, to meet his plunges, to grab her satisfaction, because suddenly, urgently, she needed to come
now
.

But he held her pinned, pumping his hips in deliberate, sweeping thrusts. Each time he pushed in, the pressure was like hot needles of anticipation. She gritted her teeth, no longer a woman in pursuit of anything but sex, and more sex, and more sex, until all the thoughts and memories had been dissolved by a primal rhythm and a reckless mating.

His face grew dark red. The cords and veins of his neck strained with the effort. He gazed down at her as if trying to possess her mind as he possessed her body. It was almost as if he wanted to take her again for the first time, or imprint on her what it meant to be his.

The heat between them grew.

Her hands clutched his shoulders, not because she feared he would drop her, but because she didn’t know where she was going. She was drowning in rapture, powerless to fight against the current, but wanting... wanting...

The spasms, when they struck, were overwhelming, a tidal wave of climax that caught her, carried her along, and slammed her onto shore.

And he rode the wave with her, groaning out his greed for her.

When the motion slowed, when it stopped, he stood gasping, pressing her against the wood.

She was trembling, covered with perspiration, unable to comprehend something so violent and so savage.

With a primitive grunt, he lifted her away from the wall and carried her to the bed.

With his erection still embedded inside her, he carefully laid her across the mattress. It was wet between them, proving he had come, yet still he was hard. Still he filled her body and filled her passions.

She had reached satiation.

Yet if he wanted to take her again, she would let him. More than that, she would delight in him.

Bending over her, he opened her bodice. Picking up her cross, he held it in his palm. He closed his eyes, and a tremor shuddered through him.

“What is it?” she asked. “Are you in pain?”

“In pain? God, yes. Sorcha, listen to me.” He caught her face in his hands. “I have instructions for you.”

“What are you talking about?” Why was he using that tone? He was pulling her out of her blissful respite and dragging her back to the real world. Not the real world where they saved each other’s lives and afterward talked together, but the real world where he’d made a fool of her and burned her sisters’ letters.

“I’m talking about you. You’re never again to dress in boy’s clothes. You’re never again to go to a whorehouse or a low tavern.”

She tried to struggle up on her elbow.

He subdued her with a thrust of his cock, then another, then another. When her hips rose toward him, when she clutched him with her knees, he spoke again. “You’re never again to smile at another man. You are never again to trade horses for any reason.”

She didn’t understand him. She didn’t know why he lectured her when they could be just... just talking. Communicating. Together. “Why are you so angry? I don’t understand.”

“You’re never to put yourself at risk again. Never. Never. Never.” He punctuated each word with a movement of his hips.

No matter how much she wanted to argue, the friction he created inside her made her writhe with pleasure. She forgot what she wanted to say, why he made her so angry...

Until he said, “Tell me you love me.”

“I love you.”

“That’s what I wanted to hear.”

And although she waited for him to answer in kind, that didn’t happen. Instead she discovered that Rainger could make love without stopping and that he could drive her beautifully crazy.

And, in the cold light of morning, she realized that once again he had manipulated her.