Chapter Eight
Brandt’s body woke like clockwork as dawn was breaking across a pinkening sky, just visible from beyond the seam of the tent. It’d been late when he’d finally joined Sorcha the night before, and she had already been fast asleep. As he had planned.
It was still dark, but he never failed to wake at the same time each morning. Not surprisingly, his entire body ached, though it was not just from being in the saddle for hours on end. His limbs felt restless and coiled with tension. Tight. His body was painfully erect. He adjusted himself on the hard ground and then registered the delectably warm female body beside him. Sometime during the night, she had tucked herself into the crook of his arm and shoulder.
He froze, mid-motion. Now he understood his body’s stiff, frustrated condition. The soft press of breasts against his ribs and legs twined with his would tempt a monk. He’d never been a man led by physical impulses. No woman had ever driven him to such an ungoverned state. And yet, she seemed to do so without any effort whatsoever.
She was the most dangerous female he’d ever encountered, and he’d met a few.
Sorcha shifted against him in sleep, one long arm reaching out over the expanse of his chest. Brandt’s breath seized. The smell of lavender and heather from her wash in the river would forever be imprinted on his brain, as would the sinuous outline of her body he’d glimpsed under her damp shift.
If it were even possible, he grew harder, his mind gripped by coarse thoughts of burying himself to the hilt into her slick, wet depths. Brandt groaned. He was so sodding hard it was painful. In the privacy and solitude of his own home, he would have found no shame in a few quick strokes to relieve his engorged discomfort, but here, the very thought seemed vulgar. Barbaric.
Hell.
Swiftly, he shifted out of her half embrace and rolled into a crouch. The sooner he put some distance between them, the better. He started to pack up his belongings. Though his body was lost to lust, his mind was clear, reminding him of what women like her were capable of—highborn women who took what they wanted when they wanted. As she had done in that Selkirk square.
Granted, he’d gotten something out of the deal, but even the prize of Lockie couldn’t erase the fact that he had been manipulated from the start. Perhaps he was unfairly holding on to ancient hurts, but he could never completely trust a woman, not even one who seemed as guileless as Sorcha.
She wasn’t guileless, he reminded himself harshly. No woman was. A man could be made a fool only if he allowed himself to be one. And while Brandt could accept that Sorcha had had desperate intentions with her kiss, trust was something he guarded fiercely.
It had started with his mother, he knew.
In all his life, he had trusted only two people: Monty and Archer. And only Archer remained alive and well. Even with the two of them, Brandt had never opened himself fully. He had never let them see his true heart or the self-doubt he kept at bay on a daily basis. The fact that he belonged nowhere.
Brandt had given up on the idea of ever finding his mother. A jeweler in London had told him that the ring he possessed appeared to be the colors of one of several possible Scottish Highland clans, but given the faded crest of the ring, it had been impossible to narrow it down further. He could not summon the enthusiasm to travel to the Highlands in search of family that hadn’t wanted him in the first place. After Monty died and he became the head stable master at Worthington Abbey, life had taken on a pleasant and consistent turn. He’d been content, his existence peaceful and predictable.
Until that kiss.
And now his own body conspired against him. Sorcha made him feel things that he did not want to feel…made him have thoughts that awakened the voices within him that clamored he was nothing, could never offer anything of worth to anyone.
For that reason alone, he was glad this whole marriage was a ruse.
Only at times like these, it didn’t feel like one.
His gaze swept his wife, who had awakened and followed his lead to stand in silence, wrapping herself in a Maclaren plaid. Sorcha did not meet his eyes, her face inscrutable. The glimpse of vulnerability he’d seen the night before was gone. Now, the warrior stood in her place. When she left the tent to see to her needs after a guarded look at him, Brandt expelled a pained breath. Though part of him recognized her innocence, he had never been able to tell with women.
The courtesans in London he’d encountered with Archer in their wilder years had been masters in the art of seduction and manipulation. He’d even fancied himself in love with one who had convinced him of her undying devotion. That devotion had disintegrated the moment she’d learned he wasn’t a titled lord like his friend, the Duke of Bradburne. She—a glorified prostitute for all intents and purposes—had laughed at his true vocation.
It had only compounded the little he knew of women. That they weren’t to be trusted. Ever since, he’d barricaded his unwanted heart and relieved himself from time to time with women of a lower persuasion. Not like Sorcha…the daughter of a duke.
He was a bastard with nothing to offer her. If their marriage were real, the scandal it would cause in drawing rooms across Scotland and London combined would be unavoidable. The daughter of a duke marrying a lowborn man of uncertain origins? She’d be shunned from society. Even Malvern was a better choice than him…at least she would have been a marchioness.
“Marrying her was a sodding mistake,” he growled.
Brandt swore coarsely and heard a gasp from behind him. He turned to see Sorcha had returned. Her eyes were wide. Agonized. Hurt swam in them, before a practiced expressionless look consumed her features. He opened his mouth, but then shut it. Better for her to think the worst of him than to glorify a few kisses and a shameless bid to win a horse into something more than it could ever be.
A shout from outside had them both pushing past the tent flaps. Ronan’s men were gathering their belongings in haste as they broke camp. Brandt searched for the big man, but he was nowhere in sight. His gaze landed on Duncan who was directing two of the younger men.
“Where is Ronan?” he asked. “What’s happening?”
“Malvern,” Duncan growled, his mouth a hard line. “His trackers followed us from Doncaster, even when we rode through the river fer four miles and cut through the hills. Ronan knows these lands like the back of his hand. It should have been impossible to find us so quickly.”
Brandt frowned as something occurred to him, but Sorcha beat him to it. “Who was it? The traitor?”
“Ye brother’s questioning the lad now.”
“Was he a Maclaren?” Sorcha snarled.
Duncan shook his head. “Nae, a Cleland. Make haste, lass, our scouts report that there’s a contingent of Malvern’s men that rode through the night and are nearly upon us. Quickly now, arm yerselves.”
He nodded at Brandt before marching off toward where one of the men was dismantling their tent from the night before. Sorcha stood rigid, her arms flexing at her sides. She’d abandoned her dress in favor of riding trousers today, he noticed, though she wore the Maclaren plaid draped above it for modesty. Brandt tried not to notice how well the breeches framed her hips through the pleated folds of the navy and red plaid, nor the way the white linen shirt accentuated her chest.
Her glare was frosty enough to freeze a loch. “Why are ye just standing there staring, ye lummox?” she hissed. “Move!”
Those terse words spoken in a lilting brogue gave away her anger, if in fact the look in her eyes and the rigid set of her shoulders already had not.
Ares had already been fed, and Brandt saddled him quickly just as Ronan thundered into the clearing. He was covered in blood, his sword raised high. His battle roar made every man take up arms. “They’re upon us, lads!” He directed the horse toward Brandt, his eyes darting to where Sorcha stood. “I know ye’re set upon leaving, but I need ye, Pierce. I need ye to protect my sister with yer life.”
She scowled her displeasure. “I don’t need protecting.”
Brandt ignored her, drawing himself atop Ares. “How many?”
“Two dozen, maybe more,” Ronan said.
“And the turncoat?”
The Scot’s mouth twisted in distaste. “Slit his own throat. I should have known when he kept asking about the clans in these parts.”
“How did he do it?” Sorcha asked.
“Left behind bits of Maclaren plaid,” he said, whirling his horse around. “Breadcrumbs that led them right to us.”
“Will you break your oath not to raise arms against Malvern?” Brandt asked.
Ronan’s steely blue gaze met his. “If our lives are threatened, we have no choice but to defend ourselves.”
He didn’t seem to be too worried about the oncoming attack. One Highland warrior was the equivalent of ten English ones, but Brandt knew Malvern. The man was deviously clever. He’d earned his dubious rank in the British army by trickery and misdirection. And Coxley was a hundred times worse. He opened his mouth to warn Ronan when shouting and the sounds of battle distracted him.
Loud noises of steel crashing upon steel reached them from the other side of the clearing, when suddenly a band of armored men broke through the tree line behind them.
“They’re attacking from both sides!” Duncan rushed toward them, his sword raised, followed by three other men. They were quickly surrounded and outnumbered, but lived up to their fierce reputation. The first wave of men was easily dealt with, but more kept coming.
“Take her into the forest,” Ronan shouted to Brandt before delving into the fray.
Brandt gritted his teeth. He did not want to run from the fight, but at the moment, Sorcha’s safety was his only concern. “Come,” he said to her. “You heard what he said.”
Angry flames flared in her blue eyes. “Are ye insane? And leave my brother to die? Ye’re ape-drunk if ye think I’m leaving, Sassenach. We Scots never run from a fight.”
He ignored the bite of her address. “Ronan is a trained soldier.”
“And I, too, am a Maclaren.” Her ferocious gaze flashed daggers at him as if daring him to contradict her. “Ye may run if ye like, but I am staying.”
Brandt did not have time to argue as two men on horseback burst through the forest, riding hard toward them with guns raised. He didn’t think. Bracing his thighs on Ares’s flanks, he pulled the pistols from their holsters and fired. Both men toppled off their horses, but they weren’t out of danger yet. More men followed, and Brandt drew his sword at the same moment that Sorcha reached for the bow tied to her saddle.
Instinct took over as he swung and parried, cleaving another man clean off his horse and disarming another with a ferocious upward swipe. Blood spattered onto his clothing, but he was too busy trying to locate Sorcha to notice. Wheeling Ares around, he searched through the dueling bodies. With relief, he found her at the edge of the glade. She was standing in the stirrups, her arrows departing her bow with lethal precision. Enemies fell one by one, and Brandt felt an odd sense of pride in her skill. When she ran out of arrows, she leaped off Lockie and swung her sword with as much finesse as he’d seen that first time in the Selkirk paddock.
Fearless and savage, she was indeed every inch the Maclaren warrior she’d claimed to be. For a charged moment, her blue gaze met his across the clearing, and she scowled, her lips pulling back from her teeth as if he were to be her next target. God, she was magnificent. Exhilaration churned in his blood, and Brandt realized with a start that he was half aroused. He almost laughed. Only one woman could provoke him so indecently in the midst of a turbulent battle.
Kicking Ares into a canter, he ran through two more of Malvern’s men, and intent on reaching her side, he did not see the horse charging toward him from the back. He did see the warning shout freeze on Sorcha’s face as he tumbled face forward over Ares’s neck. The fall knocked the wind out of him, though he had crashed into another soldier who had cushioned his landing.
The man who had knocked him off his horse was a brute almost as large as Ronan, his face beneath the dented helm, scarred and ugly.
“Mr. Pierce,” he greeted him in a guttural voice. “’Twill be my pleasure to deliver your head to his lordship and collect the reward of one hundred guineas.”
“That’s all?” Brandt scoffed, retrieving a fallen sword from a dead soldier. “My good man, I’ll have you know I’m worth much more than that. You’ve been cheated.”
“No matter, the marquess will pay in gold, and you will pay in blood.”
Brandt swung the sword in a slow circle as the man wheeled his mount around to charge him again. Though it agonized him to do it, at the last minute he fell to his knees and swung the blade backward and upward into the rump of the horse. It was not a killing stroke, but enough for the animal to rear up wildly and toss the rider from his back. For a man of his size, the soldier vaulted into a fighting stance with unusual grace.
He and Goliath circled each other. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Sorcha slashing her way toward him. He wanted to shout for her to stay away. She would only be a distraction, and he sensed he would need all his wits to not be killed at the hands of this monster. The man was not hired muscle like most of the corpses littering the glade, but a trained assassin. It was evident in the way he moved, in the glint of his eye. Here was a man who had delivered death, lived in rivers of blood, and would not hesitate to split him in two, if he was distracted even for a moment.
Brandt drew a breath and lifted his sword. He danced out of the way of Goliath’s strikes and fended off a third that reverberated down the length of his arms. Sparks flew from the edges of the steel as they met again. The man was strong and skilled, and it took all of Brandt’s concentration to read his body language. It was the only way he could stay ahead of him.
Suddenly, a feminine shout diverted his attention, and the next thing he knew a fist hit him square in the chest and he was flying through the air. He crashed down to the ground in a tangle of arms and legs, his brain rattling around in his skull at the impact. It took him two seconds to collect himself before the giant was upon him. He rolled out of the way as the sword came down in a glinting silver arc. Brandt didn’t care. His attention was behind the man, on Sorcha.
Driven only by instinct, Brandt sidestepped Goliath’s blows, weaving and ducking as fast as he was able. He managed to get in a few strikes and drew blood at the man’s torso, back, and legs. It wasn’t enough. The behemoth kept coming like an angry bull. Brandt needed to change his strategy.
“I told you I was worth more than a hundred quid,” he said.
“Your head is still going to be at the edge of my sword.” The man’s eyes flashed in anger, and he rushed forward. It was the opening Brandt needed. He, too, charged forward, but at the last minute, he threw his body flat and jerked up with his blade. Blood fountained over him as Goliath teetered and spun around, his eyes wide. Then he clutched at his stomach and stared at the bright gaping swatch of red that blossomed on the waistband of his breeches, spilling out his innards. With a disbelieving groan, he staggered to his knees and fell face-first into the dirt.
Another strangled scream rent the air, and Brandt felt all the breath leave his lungs in a whoosh at the sight of Sorcha being dragged toward a horse by her hair. He had no time to savor his victory, and hopping over the fallen giant, he ran toward his bride. Covered in blood, he was like a berserker streaking across the field of battle, his only objective to reach her. He got there at the same time that Ronan did—and right as Sorcha drew a dagger from her boot and plunged it into the man’s neck. She kicked him for good measure.
“Ye need to get to safety,” Ronan said, breathless. He, too, was drenched in blood, and from the easy way he was moving, Brandt guessed that most of it wasn’t his. “Malvern sent an army from the south and from the north. At least a hundred men.”
They glanced around at the bodies strewn on the field, noticing the plaids of some of the dead men. “Aye, and some of them are Scots.” Ronan spat in disgust to the blood-soaked ground. “Craven, gutless traitors bought by a pouch of gold.”
“How many men did we lose?” Sorcha asked, her chest heaving.
“Seven,” Ronan replied. “Five left, including Duncan and me. There are more of them hiding in the woods. We can take them, but ye need to run.”
Sorcha’s brows slammed together, her voice low and angry. “I won’t leave you, Ronan.”
“Ye dunnae have a choice, lass,” he said gently. “It’s ye Malvern wants, and the death of yer husband. He intends to make ye a widow.” He turned to Brandt and grasped him by the forearm. “I’ll hold him off for as long as I can. Get my sister to the Brodie, ’tis the only place she’ll be safe. Ye fought well. Take care of her, ye ken?”
“You have my word.”
As Ronan mounted his horse and rode back the way he’d come, Brandt wondered if he’d see him again. He could see the same thoughts reflected in Sorcha’s face and in the sadness that shimmered in her eyes. She bit her lip hard, her nostrils flaring. Brandt wanted to comfort her, but he sensed it would not be welcomed. Not after how he’d left things between them in the tent. Perhaps it was for the best. Distance would serve them better than any kind of familiarity.
He watched as she retrieved Lockie, and then whistled for Ares who trotted up within moments. Leading their horses together with weapons drawn, they melted quietly into the woods toward the river, until the noise started to fade in the distance behind them. Brandt was relieved to see both stallions seemed no worse for wear and suffered no fresh wounds. Ares, particularly. Every new scar made him ache for the brave beast. Ares had endured more than his share of pain over the years, and the horse’s loyalty was enough to rival most men’s.
Sorcha groaned and leaned against Lockie after leading him to water, where he drank thirstily. Brandt frowned. “You’re hurt,” he said, noticing the strip of red across the side of her shirt beneath the plaid.
“It’s nothing, a flesh wound.”
“Let me see,” he said and lifted the edges.
She snatched at the plaid, but Brandt had already caught sight of the weeping incision that traversed the span of two lower ribs. It was a shallow cut, though it seemed to be bleeding profusely, making the scarlet-hued linen stick to her flesh. Sorcha grimaced as his fingers snagged on the cloth. “We should clean it.”
“I’ll be fine, I told ye!”
“Not if you invite infection. Don’t be stubborn, Sorcha.”
The look she sent him spoke volumes. “Stubborn,” she hissed. “Perhaps ye should have considered that before ye stayed and took me to wife, instead of running like I told ye to. Then you wouldnae have the burden of regret on yer shoulders.”
Brandt did not respond to the anger in her voice, if only because of the sheen of tears in her eyes. “I’ll regret if you die on my watch when I’ve just given my word to your brother to keep you safe. Now let me see that wound.”
Grudgingly, she let him examine her, and though he was gentle, she still flinched away from his touch. He took a piece of linen from his saddlebags and soaked it in the icy river before applying it to her split skin. Sorcha winced but bore the pain in silence as he cleaned the wound and bandaged it with another wide strip of clean linen.
She eyed him quietly the whole time, not saying a word until he had finished the wrapping. Brandt couldn’t help noticing she kept both forearms banded tightly over her breasts, allowing him only a limited view of her torso. Not that she had need to worry—open, ragged wounds had a way of deterring carnal urges.
“There,” he said. “Good as new.”
“Shouldn’t you be on your way to England by now?”
Her brogue was gone, he realized. Brandt met her blazing blue gaze. “That can wait,” he said. “We need to leave before we’re discovered. We aren’t far enough away for my liking.”
“Why do you even care?” she asked. “It’s exceedingly obvious you don’t wish to be saddled with a wife…or me. You should leave while you can. I can look after myself.”
“I don’t doubt that, but I gave your brother my vow.”
“You seem to hand out vows rather easily, Mr. Pierce.” Her nostrils flared. “Your word is not worth the breath that expelled it.”
“Sorcha—”
She spun on her heel and moved toward the grazing horses, but froze at a crashing sound from the nearby bushes.
“She went this way, I tell you,” a man’s voice said. “I saw her and the Englishman with that gray horse of hers.”
“Are you sure, Coxley?”
Brandt frowned. Damn. Malvern’s dog…the twisted, belly-slitting ex-colonel who had been at his liege’s side in the Selkirk stable yard. If Coxley was here, it meant Malvern was close. Brandt met Sorcha’s eyes and placed a finger to his lips, wishing that the horses were closer and not at the river’s edge. But it was too late to make a run for it, or to whistle for Ares. The approaching sounds grew closer, and then Coxley and his guard emerged from the other side of a large tree, his expression triumphant as it fell on the two of them.
“Well, well, what have we here,” he crowed, pointing two pistols right at them.