“He had two blades,” Keenan said (5 page)

“So you decided to join the boy,” said the marshal thickly and pulled her up by her bare arm.
I could chain her inside one of the cells, up against the wall, her plump arse bare…

Serena gagged as the man’s thoughts slid along her mind. In practiced defense she erected her most impenetrable barriers to muffle the repulsive images. It left her flushed, breathless.

“It would be wise for ye to take yer hands off the lass,” the warrior said behind her.

Even without her senses, Serena heard the thinly veiled threat behind the words.

The marshal snorted and dropped her arm. “No use, girl, your brother is staying the night.” The marshal motioned to the men who dragged William along the stone hallway and out of her sight. Keys jingled as the marshal pulled his dirty hand from his pocket. He took a step closer to Serena.

She could smell the foulness of his breath mixed with the odor of old sweat. His voice lowered.

“Now if you want your brother to have a comfortable stay, say with water and food, we may be able to strike a bargain, lovey.” He grinned, showing dark teeth.

Serena fought the revulsion that threatened at the base of her throat. She didn’t move away.

Keenan Maclean came up behind them.

“Stay back there, Scot, me and the lady is having a private discussion.” The marshal reached out to grab her arm again.

Taking a quick breath, Serena stumbled forward into the rank man.

The strong hands of the Highlander pulled her back quickly, just like she’d hoped. But it had been enough time to find the jingle in the marshal’s pocket.

“There will be no private discussions with the lady.” The Highlander’s voice cut through the air with sharp authority.

The marshal shrugged his shoulders. “Too bad for the boy.”

The other two men came back out.

She needed a distraction, but what would keep the men outside the small jailhouse? Serena tried to breathe evenly to douse the tingling that had started in her arms. The edge of panic made her mind whirl frantically from one idea to the next. She walked back over to the Highlander’s large horse.

He followed. “I will take ye back to the faire.” He stepped up close to her.

She needed his help, but could she trust him? A man she couldn’t even read? All her life she’d caught glimpses of thoughts and feelings from people. She learned their secrets without trying, their deepest desires, their hushed sins. Darkness lurked in every person. How could she trust someone she couldn’t read at all? Even his expression seemed blank. He moved closer to her, and his fresh smell cleansed her of the marshal’s foul scent. Serena drank it in.

“I cannot leave William. He will die if I don’t get him out of there.” She searched his veiled face then sighed softly. “I know you don’t believe me, but I know that William did not stab your friend. They made it look like he did.”

“Ye saw these people?”

“Yes, no, well in a way I saw them.”

“Ye were there; ye were part of the robbery.”

“No, no, there was no robbery.” She shook her head. Her foot stamped on the cooling dirt. “It was a last minute farce to make it look like one.”

“How do ye ken all of this if ye weren’t there?”

Serena’s eyes dropped to the ground. “It is hard to explain.” She looked up. “I know certain things. I can see them from a distance, sometimes before they happen.”

His eyes searched hers, but he didn’t ask any questions. Without questions she couldn’t defend herself so she held silent, waiting for him to weigh her words.

William’s pain echoed like a dull ache in her mind. He couldn’t read her mind, but she pleaded silently with him anyway. Let him read her desperation in her eyes.

“In return, ye will help me find those who killed Gerard?”

Serena hadn’t expected that. She had seen them, the man and woman along with the hired murderer. But what choice did she have? She nodded quickly. “Once my brother is safe, I will help you find them.” She wanted to find them, these criminals responsible for nearly killing her brother, ruining his name, ruining his family’s name. Finding these people was important to the Highlander too. Perhaps he would truly help.

He gave one quick nod. “A bargain, it is set,” he said plainly and looked around.

Serena saw that the three men still stood outside the jailhouse, but how much longer would they? “You need to keep them out here,” Serena whispered and produced the keys in the folds of her skirts so that he could see them.

“Yer a pickpocket.”

“Only when absolutely necessary.” She hid the keys once more in a deep pocket tied around her waist under her petticoat. “I will go in through the back.” She hoped that there was in fact a back door and that one of the keys would work in it. “I can find William and bring him out. We will hide in the woods beyond and wait for you.”

The Highlander stared. Serena sighed in frustration. What was he thinking? She couldn’t tell from his thoughts or from his face. “Will you come for us?”

“Aye, lass, I will come for ye. If ye canna bring him out, hide on yer own. I will find ye.”

She nodded and hoped he wasn’t lying. It didn’t matter for she didn’t have a choice.

“So how will you distract…” Serena swallowed a breath with her unspoken words as he pulled her against his solid body. In one swift movement he wound his hands through her long hair and tugged gently to bring her face up to his. His lips descended on hers with such ferocious intent that she thought she’d be consumed by his kiss. Never had she been kissed so thoroughly. At first he had to hold her to him, her body limp with shock. But blood thrummed through her veins, heating, melting her along his length. She pushed back against him. The Highlander’s hands cupped her face. He slanted her head so that they fit perfectly against one another.

Serena barely noticed the whoops from the three jailors. She struggled to stay afloat under the onslaught of feelings rushing through her body. Her heart beat against the bone between her breasts as if beating upon the bars of a cell.

He released her mouth and ran lips down the naked column of her neck. A tingling spread goosebumps, causing nipples to harden against her bodice. Liquid heat pooled at the juncture of her legs, making them wobble slightly. The sensations washed away the inner struggle. Like a strong drink it deadened the thoughts and feelings until she drowned in peaceful heat. Without the constant battle to ignore his thoughts and emotions, Serena’s other senses pulled in the fullness of the sensations Keenan poured into her.

He branded a path with hot breath back to her face and over to her ear. At the same time, his hands sloped down to her backside, squeezing it, molding it to the evidence that he was just as affected by the kiss as she was.

“Now push me away, slap me and run as if back to the faire.” His breath sounded ragged, like her own, and it took several heartbeats for his instructions to register in her bloodless brain. This was the distraction.

William, she thought, shaking off the languid heat. Pinpricks of her brother’s fear and pain shot ice through her overheated body. It was a wonder that she didn’t see steam billow up.

Serena yanked her head away from him. “Get off me,” she shrieked with real anger, anger for losing herself in the farce. Serena shoved against his chest with all the embarrassment she felt, all the shame. The Highlander had befuddled her mind in mere seconds. He released enough to give her access to his face. Serena’s slap shattered the hollowness of the night, causing the jailors to double over in raucous laughter. She also kicked the Highlander’s shin. He grunted and released her roughly as he rubbed the abused leg.

“Bloody wench,” he cursed loudly, and she ran down the road until it turned, her arms pumping.

Serena huffed, feet pounding against the dirt as she ducked off the road. She closed her eyes and breathed deeply of the moist earthy scent around her and waited for her blood to stop rushing. Her face flushed hot in the chilled air, and she touched her lips. It was only a diversion, but she’d dived right in. Like some gypsy tramp. Serena rubbed hands over her face and purposely moved her thoughts to William. There would be time for humiliation later. When her breathing slowed to a more normal pace, she gathered and tied skirts high so they would stay free of the undergrowth. In silence, she circled through the trees back behind the gaol. There she watched the silhouetted clouds glide to obscure the glowing moon and dashed to the rear of the stone building.

Serena heard a single chirp overhead and saw Chiriklò, more with mind and ears than with eyes. He sat above a hinged door in the wall of the building. The bird darted in and out between the bars of a small window in the door. Serena tried to reach the window, but she wasn’t tall enough. She stopped struggling and followed the path of the bird with her mind as it moved from cell to cell down the straight inner corridor. Some of the cells were empty. Others were not.

Serena slid her mind past each inhabitant, their resentment, their fear, their pain. One had stolen food for his children and he worried about them now. One was locked inside for a murder. Bleak desperation clung to two others. At last she found William. She focused her thin thread of power over him and through him. He was somewhat conscious. Fear and confusion mingled together, accented by sharp stabs of anger and pain.

“I’m coming, Shoshòy,” she whispered and forced the head of one key into the rough lock. She tried to turn it, but it wouldn’t budge. She tried another. One had to fit, it just had to fit.

Chiriklò flew back to the window and chirped once. Bawdy laughter from the front of the jailhouse danced back to her on the breeze, twisting her stomach. Finally. The third key turned and the door swung inwards.

The stench of bodily waste and decay slapped against her face. She staggered, catching herself on the slime-molded wall, and then hurried ahead. Ignoring the brush of something against her foot, she slipped down the side of the corridor to William’s cell. Her senses open, she felt the wavering hope as one of the inmates watched her go by. Would he betray her? Would any of them betray her? None but the one had seen her so far. She moved to the man’s cell and tried one of the keys. The lock clicked open.

“Keep silent if you value your life,” she whispered and pointed to the back door that still stood ajar. He nodded and crept toward it.

Chiriklò sat across from the man’s cell at another door. His thoughts flitted to her. She should open as many cells as she could. With all the prisoners missing, not just William, the tribe wouldn’t take the full brunt of suspicion.

“On the way out,” she thought back to her pet. The same key turned easily in William’s cell. Serena pulled him off the filthy straw scattered over the stone floor. Rustling and squeaks came from a corner as something bit at her leather shoe. She kicked out at the dark lump, eliciting more squeaks.

“Àngelas?” William asked wearily.

“Shh.” She braced him to lie across her shoulder and upper back. “Can you walk?”

“Yes, not well though.” He grimaced. “My shoulder…”

“Shhh,” she instructed.

“Àngelas, I didn’t…”

“Hush, I know.”

She held his weight as they shuffled along the corridor, step by step. He was large, a man now. His weight made her clumsy, and she fell against the stone wall several times. As she reached each door that held a prisoner, she jabbed the key into the lock and turned. She’d leave it up to the surprised occupants to find their way out. Serena was almost to the end when she saw the man in the last cell looking at her through his bars. He looked to be the age of King Will.

“How about me, lass?” The thick voice held the rolling brogue of a Scotsman. This man had murdered someone, she was certain. She didn’t have time to probe more, for reasons or justifications. But he would probably give her away if she left him. Serena pushed the key in and turned it, stumbling again under William’s weight. Her brother had lost consciousness again with the pain and loss of blood. Serena grunted with exertion as she moved closer to the cracked back door. How would she ever make it out into the woods? The other men had staggered past her and out the door, only the murderer remained behind them.

Serena’s burden lightened as the stranger transferred William’s weight to his own back.

“Ye willna get far that way, lass.” He followed her out into the night.

Once they stepped out into the moonlight, Serena turned to the prisoner. His fuzzy beard covered much of his face, giving him a rough look in his torn, ragged clothing. The filth layered onto him made him difficult to see, but his eyes reflected the brightness of the moon. There was kindness in them, kindness in the man’s heart. “I will take him, thank you,” she said.

The man shook his head. “Ye canna carry his weight.” He shifted William across his back. “Ye willna leave him?”

“He’s my brother.” She touched William’s shoulder where her scarf still held the blood. “He’s been shot.”

The prisoner shifted William again so that he didn’t press on his injured shoulder. “I will carry him where ye want me to.” He stared into her face, and the side of his bearded mouth went up in a grin. “A kindness repays a kindness.”

She hesitated for only a moment and waved him after her as she moved swiftly into the woods. She didn’t know where to go. It had to be far enough away from Leeds Gaol, but close enough for Keenan Maclean to find them. She certainly hoped the Highlander knew how to track. If he didn’t find them, what would she do? Her heart thumped wildly from the need to run. This was a race, a race to save her brother. Her pulse thrummed so loudly that she could hear it. Its tempo propelled her forward on light feet through the night like a doe caught in the scent of the wolf.