Hands closing about her waist, then sliding further to hold her in a loose embrace, he nodded. “We are. But I have a confession to make.”
Taken aback, she searched his eyes but saw nothing beyond the warmth she’d grown so accustomed to shining back at her. Reassured, she made her tone encouraging. “What?”
“Yes, well, that’s the thing.” His lips curved, rueful yet still relaxed. “I was determined never to let the words cross my lips, had sworn I would never utter them, but after today, after sitting in that carriage, blind, out of sight of you, not knowing if you were in danger, if some terrible fate was threatening you…” His expression changed, all warmth falling away, leaving an emotion far more stark and powerful etched over the chiseled lines of his face.
Her heart thudded as, amazed, she recognized what that emotion was.
“I nearly broke. Nearly overthrew all caution, all sense, nearly flung open the carriage door and came after you.”
Locked in his dark gaze, she released one lapel, placed that hand on his chest, over his heart. “But you didn’t.”
“No. I didn’t. It was a close run thing—but I didn’t.” He nodded, lips firming, his eyes on hers. “So yes, Emily Ensworth, we’re going to have a life partnership—we’re going to have the trust, the sharing of all life’s challenges. Before, when we spoke of this, I wasn’t sure how far I could go—how much of what you wanted I could give you—but now I know. Today showed me. Not that you were up to the task—that I never doubted, not from the instant I met you in Bombay after you’d ridden in with the letter from James. I was so proud of you—I admired you, your strength and character, from then. I knew long before today that you could handle anything, including the challenge of sharing your life with me. But today I discovered that I was up to the task, too—that I could, if pushed, trust your strength and put my faith in your abilities as you, so often on our travels, put your faith in mine.”
He drew a huge breath, his chest swelling beneath her hand. She didn’t say a word, too enthralled, too eager to hear what next he would say.
Gareth looked into her shining eyes, the moss-green bright, shimmering with encouragement and a love he’d never thought to find. “Having you go into danger without me at your side is never going to be something I will willingly countenance, but today I learned that I could live through the vulnerabilty, so there’s no longer any point in not saying the words I’d sworn I never would.”
“What words?” She all but quivered in his arms, so alive, so vibrant, and all his.
He smiled, and let the words fall freely, let them come of their own accord and simply be, testament to his reality. “I love you. You are the sun, the moon, and the stars to me—I can’t imagine a life without you at its center. Yes, I want to marry you—quite desperately want to marry you—but that want owes nothing to anything but my need.
“I need you—I need your love. I need you to be my future. We started, before, to paint in my blank slate, but I can’t finish the picture of my future without you at its center.”
She pressed closer, pushed her hands up over his shoulders, winding her arms about his neck. Sheer happiness bubbled in her voice as she said, “I was so proud of you today—when you let me do what I could do. I was never so much as vaguely attracted to MacFarlane, but women can have honor, too, and I wanted to—needed to—do something, something real, to help catch the Black Cobra. And now I have, I can leave it to you and all the other men here to catch the fiend, whoever he is, and bring him to justice.
“Now”—she stretched up on her toes, bringing her lips to within a whisker of his—“I can turn my attention—all my attention and energy—to us. To our partnership, our future—our marriage.”
Her eyes all but glowed, shimmering with emotion as she stared into his. “You are my one—the one I’ve been waiting to find for so long, the one I went to India to seek, the one I love with all my heart. Now I’ve found you, I will never let you go.”
He felt his lips curve. “Good.”
He kissed her—or she kissed him. Between true partners, it didn’t matter which it was. All that mattered was the heat that instantly sprang to life, that flared and curled comfortingly all around them.
That drew them in and seduced them.
Then flamed.
Clothes scattered, discarded with abandon.
They barely made it to the bed.
And then there was nothing beyond the flames and the passion, the desire and the need to be one.
Together.
Linked, twining, merging.
Giving and taking and striving for more.
Possessing, then surrendering.
She had a saying she was fond of, that actions always spoke louder than mere words. If he’d doubted the veracity of that claim, she would have convinced him that night.
She took him in with a joy that eclipsed all he’d ever known, embraced him and gave him more than he could fathom.
She was his all, his everything, then and evermore.
Emily could imagine no greater joy than when she shattered beneath him and, looking up through awestruck, love-struck eyes, saw his face in that instant when he lost himself in her.
Saw all he’d until then tried to shield.
Saw vulnerability acknowledged, accepted, and held close.
Saw love and abject devotion in his eyes.
Finally saw him, all he was, clearly—her warrior with an unshielded heart.
They slumped together, arms tight, possessive even in aftermath, waiting for their thundering hearts to slow, waiting for reality to reclaim them.
When he finally eased from her arms, withdrew from her and slumped on his stomach beside her, she was already planning. “We’ll wait here.” Turning her head, she caught his eye. “I’m happy to wait here until the other two—Monteith and Carstairs—arrive. Until they’re safe.” Sliding around, down into the bed beside him, she raised a hand and traced one heavy shoulder. “You won’t be able to concentrate on our future until then—and in truth, neither will I.”
The one eye she could see held hers, then he humphed and turned his head fully her way. “They’ll be here soon. Logan tomorrow, and although Royce has said nothing about when Rafe is due, I’m sure it’ll be no more than two days.”
She smiled, a slow smile of anticipation. “Good.”
She continued to smile, but her gaze grew distant. Her hand continued to stroke Gareth’s bare shoulder. After a minute had ticked by, curious, he asked, “What are you thinking of?”
She refocused on him, and her smile deepened. “I was just thinking: If only my family could see me now.”
He looked at her in mock horror, then lifted his head and dropped it back into the pillow. “Thank God they can’t.”
“You do understand that he had to die, don’t you?” In the drawing room of the house they’d made their headquarters in Bury St. Edmunds, Alex topped up Daniel’s glass from the decanter of fine brandy Roderick had liberated from the locked sideboard.
How very apt, Daniel thought, as he took a healthy swallow. As usual, Alex was abstemious, but tonight he was also sipping from a glass.
“Poor Roderick.” With a shake of the head, Alex replaced the decanter on the sideboard. “So…sadly ineffectual.”
“Indeed.” Daniel took another swallow. He was still a trifle shocked—not by Roderick’s death itself—that had, he suspected, been coming for some time; it was his idiot half brother’s lack of thought for consequences that had landed the three of them in this mire after all. Still, he hadn’t seen it coming—hadn’t seen Death in Alex’s eyes until the dagger had slid home.
But Alex had been right. Roderick had had to die, then and there, in that moment. Thanks to Alex’s quick thinking, the pair of them had got clean away.
Daniel raised his glass, locked eyes with Alex, now seated on the sofa nearby. “To Roderick—the idiot—who was convinced to the last that our sire would always save him. He was a fool, but he was our brother.?
?? He drank.
Alex sipped. “Half brother.” Alex’s lips curved. “Sadly, he missed the better half—the cleverer half.”
Daniel tipped his glass in acknowledgment, but said nothing. He and Alex shared a father, but their mothers had been different, so the cleverer half Alex alluded to he had missed as well. He looked at his glass, and decided he’d better stop drinking.
“But Roderick no longer matters, my dear. We do.” Alex’s voice was low but clear, as always compelling. “And we need to take steps to ensure our necks remain free of the hangman’s noose.”
“Indubitably.” Setting down his glass, Daniel met Alex’s eyes. “As ever, I’m yours to command, but I suspect I’d better go and check on Monteith. We need his copy of the letter.”
Alex nodded. “While you’re doing that, I’ll organize another move. Sadly, here, we’re too close to where Roderick met his end. Our opponents might think to search. I’ll have somewhere else organized—not too far away—by the time you get back with Monteith’s letter.”
“And then we’ll need to get a welcome in place for Carstairs.”
“Indeed.” Alex’s eyes glittered. “I’ll start work on that tomorrow, too. Now we know he’s coming down the Rhine, and at speed, then it’s all but certain he’ll pass through Rotterdam. I’ve already sent orders to all those on the other side of the Channel to ensure he runs into a very warm reception. But given that the other three have all come this way, what are the odds, do you think, that he’s making for either Felix-stowe or Harwich? They are, after all, the closest and most convenient ports to this part of the country.”
“He’ll be carrying the original, won’t he?”
Alex nodded. “Just the fact he’s coming in on the most direct route…our puppetmaster isn’t trying to draw out cultists with him, but to give him the shortest and safest road, the best possible chance of reaching the puppetmaster. That’s why he’s the last, and also why Monteith is coming in from the opposite direction.”
“So Carstairs won’t be long.”
“No, but what I have planned in Rotterdam will at least slow him down, which is all we need.” Alex looked at Daniel. “You take care of Monteith, and leave me to put our welcome for Carstairs in place. By the time you get back with Monteith’s letter, all will be set.” Alex smiled, viciously intent. “Whoever our puppetmaster is, I guarantee Carstairs will never reach him.”
Daniel nodded and stood. “I’d better get going if I’m to join the men tonight.”
“Where exactly are they?”
“In a deserted barn outside a village called Eynesbury. I left them with strict orders to keep watch for Monteith and make sure he doesn’t reach Cambridge. They’ll know where he’s spending the night.” Daniel smiled, envisioning carnage. “I believe I’ll pay Major Monteith a midnight visit.”
Alex understood what he was planning. “Very good. And who knows what possibilities tomorrow might bring? Take care, my dear—I’ll see you later tomorrow, once you have Monteith’s copy.”
Daniel saluted. “Until then.”
He turned away and strode for the door, and so didn’t see the way Alex watched him.
Didn’t feel the cold, piercing weight of those ice-blue eyes.
After he’d passed through the open doorway and disappeared, Alex sat staring at the vacant space.
Debating.
Several minutes ticked past.
Then Alex turned and looked toward the doorway at the far end of the room. “M’wallah!”
When the fanatical head of Alex’s personal guard appeared, Alex coldly said, “Have someone saddle my horse, and lay out my riding breeches, jacket, and my heavy cloak. I expect to be out all night.”
The Brazen Bride
STEPHANIE
LAURENS
The
Brazen
Bride
THE BLACK COBRA QUARTET
He was startlingly,
heartbreakingly,
breathtakingly beautiful.
His face, all clean, angular lines and sculpted planes, embodied the very essence of masculine beauty—there was not a soft note anywhere. Combined with the muscled hardness of his body, that face promised virility, passion—and direct, unadorned, unadulterated sin.
Such a face did not belong to a man given to sweetness but to action, command, and demand.
Chiseled lips, firm and fine, sent a seductive shiver down her spine. The line of his jaw made her fingertips throb. He had winged black brows, a wide forehead, and lashes so black and thick and long she was instantly jealous.
As usual her instincts had been right. This man was—would be—dangerous. To her peace of mind, if nothing else.
Men like this—who looked like he did, who had bodies like his—led women into sin.
And into stupidity.
One
December 10, 1822
One o’clock in the morning
On the deck of the Heloise Leger, the English Channel
Hell hath no greater fury than the cataclysmic storms that raked the English Channel in winter. With elemental tempest raging about him, Major Logan Monteith leapt back from the slashing blade of a Black Cobra cult assassin. Raising his saber to counter the second assassin’s strike, using his dirk, clutched in his left fist, to fend off the first attacker’s probing knife, Logan suspected he’d be learning about the afterlife all too soon.
Winds howled; waves crashed. Water sluiced across the deck in a hissing spate.
The night was blacker than Hades, the driving rain a blurring veil. Falling back a step, Logan swiped water from his eyes.
As one, the assassins surged, beating him back toward the prow. Blades met, steel ringing on steel, sparks flaring, pinpricks of brightness in the engulfing dark. Abruptly, the deck canted—all three combatants desperately fought for balance.
The ship, a Portuguese merchantman bound for Portsmouth, was in trouble. Logan had been forced to join its crew five days before, when, on reaching Lisbon, he’d discovered the town crawling with cultists. Battered by pounding waves, buffetted and tossed on the storm-wracked sea, as the deck leveled, the ship wallowed and swung, no longer held into the wind. Whether the rudder had broken or the captain had abandoned the wheel, Logan couldn’t tell. He couldn’t spare the time to squint through the rain-drenched dark at the bridge.
Instinct and experience kept his eyes locked on the men facing him. There’d been a third, but Logan had accounted for him in the first rush. The body was gone, claimed by the ravening waves.
Saber swinging, Logan struck, but immediately was forced to block and counter, then retreat yet another step into the narrowing prow. Further confining his movements, reducing his options. Didn’t matter; two against one in the icy, pelting rain, with his grips on his dirk and his saber cramping, leather-soled boots slipping and sliding—the assassins were barefoot, giving them even that advantage—he couldn’t effectively go on the offensive.
He wasn’t going to survive.
As he met and deflected another vicious blow, he acknowledged that, yet even as he did his innate stubbornness rose. He’d been a cavalry officer for more than a decade, fought in wars over half the globe, been through hell more than once, and survived.
He’d faced assassins before, and lived.
Miracles happened.
He told himself that even as, teeth gritted, he angled his saber up to block a slash at his head—and his feet went from under him, pitching him back against the railing.
The wooden scroll-holder strapped to his back slammed into his spine.
From the corner of his eye, he saw white teeth flash in a dark face—a feral grin as the second assassin swung and slashed. Logan hissed as the blade sliced down his left side, cutting through coat and shirt into muscle, grazing bone, before angling across his stomach to disembowel him. Instinct had him flattening against the railing; the blade cut, but not deep enough.
Not that that would save him.
Lightning cracked, a jagge
d tear of brilliant white splitting the black sky. In the instant’s illumination, Logan saw the two assassins, dark eyes fanatically gleaming, triumph in their faces, gather themselves to spring and bring him down.
He was bleeding, badly.
He saw Death, felt it—tasted ashes as icy fingers pierced his body, reaching for his soul.
He dragged in a last gasp, braced himself. Given his mission, given his occupation for the last several years, Saint Peter ought at least consider letting him into Heaven.
A long-forgotten prayer formed on his lips.
The assassins sprang.
Crack!!
Impact—sudden, sharp, catastrophic—flung him and the assassins overboard. The plunge into turbulent depths, into the churning fury of the sea, separated them.
Tumbling in the icy dark, instinct took hold; righting himself, Logan struck upward. His dirk was still in his left fist; he’d released his saber, but it was tied to his belt by its lanyard—he felt the reassuring tap of the hilt against his leg.
He was a strong swimmer. The assassins almost certainly weren’t—it would be a wonder if they could swim at all. Dismissing them—he had more pressing concerns—he broke the surface and hauled in a huge breath. He shook his head, then peered through the water weighing down his lashes.
The storm was at its height, the seas mountainous. He couldn’t see beyond the next towering wave, while with elemental rage the wind whipped and strafed, shrieking worse than a thousand banshees.
The ship had been in open water in the middle of the Channel when the storm had hit, but he had no idea how far, the tempest had tossed them, nor any clear idea of direction. No idea if land was close, or …
He’d been losing blood when he’d hit the water. How long he would last in the cauldron of icy waves, how soon his already depleted strength would fail—