Her actions had laid waste to her former life.
MAXIMUS FELT HIS heart beat faster that night as he made his way through the shadows of London dressed as the Ghost of St. Giles. It was as if he could no longer keep a raging beast inside. Nearly twenty years—more than half his life—he’d spent in this hunt. He’d not married, not sought out friendship or lovers. All his time, all his thought, all his soul was bent on one thing:
Avenging his parents. Finding their killer. Making the world somehow right again.
And tonight, now, he was as close as he’d ever been to failure.
It began to rain as if the heavens themselves wept at his weakness.
He paused, tilting his face to the night sky, feeling the drops run cold down his face. How long? Lord, how long must he search? Was Craven right? Had he done penance enough or would he forever toil?
A shout came from nearby, and without turning he ran into the night. The cobblestones were slippery beneath his boots, and his short cape whipped away behind him as if mocking his attempt at flight. The rain was relentless, but that didn’t stop the denizens of London from coming out. He passed two dandies mincing their way along, holding their cloaks over their heads. Maximus merely ducked to the side when one pointed and yelled. A horse shied as he passed, as if the animal knew the blackness blown over his soul.
More people up ahead. He’d come out too early.
Maximus darted to the right and grasped a pillar supporting an overhanging second story. He pulled himself up only to find himself face-to-face with a fair-haired child in a nightgown at the window. He paused, startled, as the child stuck a finger in her mouth and simply stared, then he began climbing again. The tiled roof was slippery, but he hoisted himself up and over the edge and began running. The rain beat down, soaking his tunic, making the shingles slippery, turning the world into a house of mourning.
Below, the people streamed through the rain, miserable and wet, while above he leaped from rooftop to rooftop, soaring through the air, risking with each jump a fatal fall to the ground.
He neared St. Giles. He knew because he could smell it: the stink of the channel, the rot of bodies living on nothing but despair and gin—always gin. He fancied he could smell the stench of the liquor itself, foul and burning, with the sweet note of juniper. Gin pervaded this entire area, drowning it in disease and death.
The thought made him want to vomit.
He stalked the night, running through the rain, haunting the rooftops of St. Giles for minutes, days, a lifetime, perhaps even forgetting what he’d come here for.
Until he found it—or rather him.
Below, in a yard so small it had no name, he saw the highwayman called Old Scratch. The man was mounted and had a whimpering youth cornered, his pistol aimed at the boy’s head.
Maximus acted on instinct and entirely without plan. He half-slid, half-climbed down the side of the building, dropping between the boy and Old Scratch.
Without hesitation Old Scratch turned his pistol on Maximus and fired.
Or tried to.
Maximus grinned, rain sliding into his mouth. “Your powder’s wet.”
The boy scrambled to his feet and fled.
Old Scratch tilted his head. “So ’tis.”
His voice was muffled by the wet scarf bound around the lower half of his face. He seemed entirely unafraid.
Maximus stepped closer and, though the light was dim, he finally got a clear look at the emerald pinned at the other man’s throat. Saw it and recognized it.
He stilled, his nostrils flaring. Finally. Dear God, finally.
His gaze flicked up to the obscured eyes of the man on the horse. “You have something that’s mine.”
“Do I?”
“That,” Maximus said, pointing with his chin. “That emerald belonged to my mother. The last of two. Do you have the other one still as well?”
Whatever he’d expected from Old Scratch, it wasn’t the reaction he got: the man threw back his head and bellowed with laughter, the sound echoing off the tilting brick walls that surrounded them. “Oh, Your Grace, I should’ve recognized you. But then, you’re not the sniveling boy you were nineteen years ago, are you?”
“No, I’m not,” Maximus said grimly.
“But you’re just as foolish,” the Devil taunted him. “If you want the last of your mother’s emeralds, I’d suggest searching within your own house.”
Maximus had had enough. He drew his sword and charged.
Old Scratch yanked on the reins and his horse reared, iron-shod hooves flashing in the night. Maximus ducked, trying to edge around the great beast to reach its master, but the highwayman wheeled his horse and gave it spur, galloping down the only alley leading out of the yard.
Maximus whirled and leaped to a corner where two walls met. He jumped and climbed, his fingers hurriedly searching for holds in the dark. He could hear the hoofbeats retreating, the sound fading. If he didn’t make the roof soon, he’d lose the man and horse in the maze of narrow streets that made up St. Giles.
Desperately, he reached for a fingerhold over his head. The brick gave without warning, coming entirely off the wall and with it his hold on the building. He fell backward, scrabbling like a rat, his fingernails scraping against the brick.
He hit the muddy ground with a thump that sent sparks flying across his vision.
And then he lay there, flat on his back in the filthy yard, his hands and back and shoulders aching, with the rain falling coldly in his face.
The moon had disappeared from the midnight sky.
ARTEMIS WOKE TO the feel of strong arms grasping her tight and lifting her from her bed. She should’ve been alarmed, but all she felt was a strange rightness. She looked up as Maximus carried her into the corridor outside her room. His face was set in grim lines, his eyes drawn and old, his mouth flat. He wore his banyan, its silk smooth beneath her cheek. She could hear his heart beating, strong and steady.
She reached up and traced the groove beside his mouth.
His gaze flicked down to hers, and the naked savagery she saw there made her gasp.
He shouldered open his door and strode to his bed, placing her there like a prize of war.
He stood over her and tore the clothes from his body. “Take it off.”
She sat up to pull her chemise over her head.
Only just in time. Naked, he crawled over her, his body hot and hard. “Never sleep anywhere but in my bed.”
She might have protested, but he turned her roughly so that she lay on her stomach, her cheek pressed into his pillow.
He lay on top of her, his upper body braced on his arms but his hips and legs weighing her down. Trapping and holding her.
“You’re mine,” he said, laying his cheek against hers. “Mine and no one else’s.”
“Maximus,” she warned.
“Yield, Diana,” he whispered, parting her legs. She could feel the thick heat of his cock pressed hard on her bottom. “Yield, warrior maiden.”
“I’m not a maiden. You took that.”
“And I would again,” he growled. “I’d steal you away and keep you in a castle far from here. Far from any other man. I’d guard you jealously and every night come to your bed and put my cock into your cunny and fuck you until dawn.”
The crude words, the near-mad sentiment, should’ve frightened her. Perhaps there was something amiss with her makeup, for they merely made her warm. No, hot. Near burning. It was all she could do to stop herself from squirming beneath him.
“Do you want that, Diana?” he muttered into her ear, his breath humid on her skin. “Do you want to be mine and only mine, away from this cursed world, in a place inhabited by just we two?”
“Oh, yes,” she said, her voice fierce.
He levered himself up. “I’d go a-hunting in the day and kill a fine stag. I’d bring it back to our hidden castle and dress it and cook it over a fire and then I’d sit you on my lap and feed you, morsel by morsel. All your sustenance would
be by my hand and mine alone.”
She laughed then, for she knew he didn’t truly want such a biddable doll. She squirmed and turned in a sudden movement so that she lay facing him.
“No, I’d hunt with you by your side,” she said as she reached up to pull his face down to hers. “I am your equal, my lord. Your equal and mate.”
“So you are,” he breathed, and bit her lip.
She tasted rain on his mouth. Rain and wine and something much darker. Something was driving him, and she needed to talk to him—about her future and about releasing Apollo. But right now, in this moment, she wanted none of reality. Reality was a screeching harridan who never could be made happy.
If she couldn’t have happiness, then she could at least have this.
She opened her mouth wide and bit her mate back, digging her nails into the nape of his neck as if to hold him as fiercely as he held her.
His chest rubbed against her nipples, and he felt warm and male. His arms braced on either side of her head, a welcome cage. And between her legs he worked his cock against her, making her slick.
He pulled back. “Like this.”
And he flipped her again.
She growled a protest and he actually laughed.
“Magnificent Diana,” he murmured into her ear, rubbing himself against her like a great tiger. “I’m going to fuck you now.”
She arched against him, part in protest at being used so cavalierly, part in sheer excitement. She felt his cock sliding into her crevasse, seeking, prodding. One day she wanted to see him—all of him. Wanted to touch and taste and explore this magnificent body, but at the moment, all she wanted was to have him in her.
She got her wish.
He thrust deep, breaching her in one violent movement, his hips coming to rest right against her bottom. She groaned, biting her lower lip.
She could hear him panting in her ear. In this position, pressed into the bed, she could hardly move, much less get the leverage to push back.
He seemed to realize her predicament. He laughed low in this throat, the sound vibrating against her back, and ground into her. She could feel him, full and rock hard, inside her, and his small deliberate movements seemed to press against something deep inside her. She felt herself growing impossibly wet, swelling with tension. She shifted her hips as much as she could, and the tiny movement prompted a growl from him. He caught her ear between his teeth as he ground deeper.
“Yield, sweet, sweet Diana,” he whispered in her ear. “You are so hot, so wet for me, I would stay here within you forever, holding you, compelling your submission.”
She tried to get her arms beneath her, to somehow push herself back against him, but he only chuckled, pulling back just enough for her to feel the head of his penis stretch her entrance before shoving back into her again. He suddenly thrust his arms under her, holding her tight as he found one breast and cupped it. His long legs braced on either side of hers, squeezing and immobilizing her.
“Diana,” he murmured in her ear, licking. “Diana, you are everything I’ve ever wanted and shall never have.”
Tears pricked at her eyes and she opened her mouth to sob.
“That’s it,” he said. “Weep for me. Bear my pain. Take my come. For I can give you nothing else.”
And he thrust into her in hard, sharp punches, each movement striking against that place within her. She gritted her teeth and bowed her head into the pillow. It was too much. Too little. A continual assault against her senses.
He laid his cheek against hers and she felt something wet between their skin. “Come, o Diana. Wash me in your passion.”
She tensed and shuddered. Once. Twice. Thrice. Like a seizure. Like a piercing of the soul.
Like the death of hope.
He sagged onto her, heavy as lead, but she was loath to make him move. Something had happened tonight to make him so wild. Something dreadful.
She turned enough so that she could stroke the back of his head, feeling the shorn hair brush her palm. “What is it? What has happened?”
He rolled off of her, but wrapped his arms around her as if he couldn’t stand not to touch her. “I met him tonight, the man who killed my parents. Met him and lost him.”
Her heart stopped. “Oh, Maximus…”
He laughed, a dry, awful sound. “He’s a highwayman who calls himself Old Scratch. My mother…” She heard him swallow before he tried again. “My mother was wearing the Wakefield emeralds the night she died—a fabulous necklace with seven emerald drops that hung off a central diamond and emerald chain. He must’ve broken it up after he stole it, for it was several years after her death before I saw the first emerald drop—on the neck of a courtesan. It’s taken me years, but I’ve collected the pieces one by one: the central chain and five of the seven drops. Last night I saw something emerald pinned to Old Scratch’s neck cloth, but I couldn’t get close enough to be sure. Tonight I did. He wears one of my mother’s emerald drops. I asked him about the other, and do you know what he said?”
“No,” Artemis whispered, a dreadful feeling welling in her chest.
Maximus’s lips twisted. “He told me to look within my own house.”
Artemis sat up. “Oh, dear God.”
Chapter Sixteen
Lin held fast to her brother even as the wildcat clawed her, for she’d been told by the strange little man in the hills that if she let go of her brother before the cock’s first crow, they would both be doomed to the wild hunt forever. So Lin grasped Tam as they rode through the night sky, and the Herla King gave no word that he saw the struggle right behind him, but his fist tightened on his horse’s reins.
Then Tam turned into a writhing serpent.…
—from The Legend of the Herla King
Maximus stared at the single emerald drop in Artemis’s palm. She’d hastily donned her chemise before running back to her room without telling him why, only to appear moments later with her hand fisted around something.
Now he wondered if he should feel betrayed. “Where the hell did you get that?”
“I…” Her hand clutched the pendants protectively. “Well, it certainly isn’t what you may be thinking.”
He blinked and raised his gaze to her face at her indignant tone. Her beautiful gray eyes were wary. They’d made love not moments before, and yet the bed felt cold now. “What am I thinking?”
She raised her eyebrows haughtily. “That I’m somehow involved with the murderer of your parents.”
Stated baldly like that, it was obviously preposterous. He shook his head. “I’m sorry. Tell me.”
She cleared her throat. “My brother gave it to me on our fifteenth birthday.”
He stiffened. “Kilbourne?”
“Yes.”
Maximus looked down, thinking. The murderer had been cautious. Maximus had only discovered the first drop nearly ten years after the murder. By tracing back through the sale of the drop, he’d realized that the jewel had only been originally sold months before. Unfortunately, that drop had been a dead end—quite literally. The owner of the original pawnshop where the emerald drop had been sold was found lying in a pool of his own blood.
Maximus had bought the last pendant over three years ago. Likely the murderer had begun to realize that Maximus was collecting the jewels—and that they might provide a link back to the murderer.
But if Artemis was correct, then the jewel she wore had come into the possession of her brother before the other drops had begun to be sold.
Before the murderer knew how dangerous the jewels were to him.
Kilbourne might have the clue to help him find the murderer. He might even know the murderer himself.
Maximus’s head snapped up. “Who did your brother get it from?”
“I don’t know,” she said simply. “He never said. I didn’t realize it was a real emerald until I tried to pawn it a couple of months ago.”
He stared at the emerald for a long moment before rising from the bed and going to the iron box
on his bedside table. He took the key from a hidden drawer in the table and opened the box. The top held a shallow tray, perfectly fitted to the inside. He’d had it lined in black velvet. On it lay what remained of his mother’s most prized possession: the Wakefield emeralds.
He felt Artemis come up beside him to look, and then she took his hand and pressed the emerald pendant into his palm. He wrapped his fingers about her hand for a moment before letting go, suddenly realizing what she’d given him: the missing piece to Old Scratch. With this he might be able to find who the man really was. Maximus swallowed, reluctant to look at her, for it wasn’t only gratitude that swelled within his chest.
Gratitude was the least of the emotions he felt for her.
He laid the pendant in its place beside her sisters.
“There’s one still missing,” she said, leaning her head on his arm.
The pendants lay in an arc around the central chain with one noticeable gap.
“Yes. The one Old Scratch wears at his throat.” He closed the box and locked it again. “When I have it, I intend to have them all reattached.”
“And then you’ll give it to Penelope,” she said quietly.
He flinched. Truly, he’d never thought that far ahead. Finding and restoring the necklace, bringing his parents’ murderer to justice, and achieving some kind of redemption occupied all his thoughts. He hadn’t considered what—if anything—came afterward.
But she was right. The necklace belonged to the Duchess of Wakefield.
He turned to look at her, this woman who had given her body and perhaps her soul to him. This woman who knew him like no other on earth. This woman he could never, never honor as he should.