Taken and Seduced (9 page)

There seemed to be nothing else to say, and they fell silent as they returned to their various blankets. Michael must be taking first watch, because she already heard Robert’s deep, steady breathing. Adam finally slid in behind her. Florrie stretched and blinked, turning to look at him drowsily over her shoulder.

“Go back to sleep,” he murmured.

She smiled and thought to relax back on her blanket, but suddenly, misleading him that she’d been asleep bothered her. “I heard what the three of you were discussing. So you think that my father sent men.”

He sighed and shook his head. “’Twould appear so. Are you pleased?”

She gave that thought. “I should be, I know. But if they capture me, they’ll return me home. I do not want to leave just yet.”

“But now is when our journey is becoming truly dangerous,” he warned.

“And I find that I don’t care.” She smiled at him with relish.

His dark eyes seemed to lighten as his gaze took in her face, then centered on her mouth. Would he kiss her? Did she want him to? For a
suspended moment, as her shoulder leaned into his chest, they stared at each other. Her breathing felt too fast, her heart seemed to find a new rhythm. She felt his hand on her hip, and then it slowly slid up her waist. Bending over her, he put his face against her neck, inhaling deeply. She gave a quiet moan and rubbed her cheek against his soft hair.

But when she felt his fingers brush the underside of her breast, she stiffened without thinking, so shocked by the pleasurable tension that was building inside her.

He froze, and suddenly she was desperate for him to continue. She brought her hand up to his head and held him against her, threading her fingers through his hair, while her body arched as if she could make him caress her.

“Florrie.” He spoke against her neck, her name a whisper on his lips.

She shuddered and turned her head. Her cheek slid along his short beard and then his breath was on her lips. She waited, wanting his kiss, ready to pull him to her.

And then his mouth pressed to hers, several gentle, sweet kisses that made her forget everything but him. Pleasure shot through her, and only intensified when his hand at last captured her breast. She trembled and quaked, feeling him knead her through her garments, as sensation flooded her body and centered between her restless thighs. This was glorious and unexpected,
and at last she knew why men and women craved each other.

She realized that he was watching her, and felt no embarrassment. Slowly his kisses deepened, parting her lips. And then she felt his tongue seeking entrance. She hadn’t imagined such a bold kiss. His mouth captured her moan even as she yielded to his persistence. He took her open mouth in a kiss that was hot and deep and wildly exciting, so unexpected.

His hand moved between her breasts, caressing, tweaking her nipples through the bodice of garments that she desperately wished were gone. To her surprise, his other hand slid beneath her body, then across her belly. She shuddered as he cupped between her thighs, pressing through her skirt. His touch was like a spark igniting a flame through her body. She wanted more. His other hand tugged at her neckline as if testing what clothing could be pulled down. She felt him touch the pendant she always wore—

And then he froze, his body so stiff it was as if they’d never enjoyed a single caress. His warm, pleasurable hands left her. He slowly lifted his head, looking past her face, his expression one of shock and growing darkness as he came up on his elbow.

“What is it?” she whispered, the first blush of shame overtaking her. Did he think her sinful now? Was she supposed to resist and prove herself a true lady?

And then she realized he hadn’t let go of her pendant. He was lifting it into the firelight, which made the Martindale crest, a rearing dragon on a shield, glitter.

And then he met her gaze, and for a moment, she saw pain in those dark blue depths. She rolled onto her back, touching his chest, desperate to find out why he was looking at her that way.

“’Tis my family crest,” she said softly, not hiding her confusion. “You know who I am, who my father is—why should this bother you?”

He sat up and she did the same, facing him. He reached beneath his own shirt and drew out a leather pouch that hung around his neck. He loosened the lacings and spilled into his hand another Martindale pendant on a chain.

F
lorrie stared at the mark of her family in confusion. This was a bigger, heavier pendant, the sort a man would wear. And Adam’s hand briefly trembled beneath it, which was almost frightening.

“Where did you get this?” she demanded.

From across the fire, Robert groaned as he sat up. “Adam, just tell her the truth. I am going to sleep with the horses, where I can have true peace.”

Florrie didn’t watch him leave; she couldn’t take her gaze from Adam, whose face had gone so cold. What had happened to the man who’d kissed her so tenderly, touched her as if she were the most delicate of creatures?

He stared at her.

“Tell me,” she said firmly. “I need to know.”

“When I had but six years of age,” he said slowly, “I enjoyed hiding from my parents.”

She didn’t know how this connected to their matching pendants, but she was willing to hear
anything about him, anything that would help her understand what drove him to risk his life.

“There was a coffer in their room that was my favorite hiding place.” He was looking at the fire now, but seeing the past, for his gaze was unfocused. “One day, I hid there, waiting to be discovered, and ended up falling asleep. When I awoke hours later, I heard an argument between my father and another man. My mother was crying.”

Florrie’s stomach was tense with a terrible premonition. She didn’t want to hear the rest—but she needed to.

“So…I lifted the lid the tiniest bit. My father and a stranger were struggling before the fire.” His eyes narrowed in concentration, staring at another fire many years later. “I remember so vividly the flash of firelight between them, the shadows of their bodies, then the glitter of a dagger.”

She couldn’t help the gasp that escaped her, and she covered her mouth with a trembling hand. In her mind, she chanted like a prayer,
Oh God
,
Oh God.

“He killed my father right before my eyes.” Adam’s voice was dispassionate, almost as if he spoke about a stranger’s death. “I dropped the lid in terror, and then I heard my mother scream. I was too afraid to look, too afraid to reveal myself. I never heard the man leave. When I finally lifted the lid again, they were both dead. I climbed out,
looking at the blood that was seeping through the woven mat on the floor.” His voice hardened. “And then I saw this.”

Stunned, sickened, Florrie stared again at the heavy pendant he suddenly held before her face.

“Recognize it?” he demanded with sarcasm.

He lifted her own chain again, and she had to move closer or have it break in his grip.

He leaned toward her. “Your father murdered my parents.”

She was trapped by the pendant in his fist, by the passion and determination in his cold eyes. Tears stung her.

“I—I cannot believe my father a murderer,” she whispered. But was she protesting too quickly? She knew he was a ruthless man.

Adam suddenly let the pendant go, and she sank back on her hands.

“The man had brown hair like yours,” he said. “Solid and stocky, not tall.”

She bit her lip.

“Martindale was seen secretly leaving the castle. He was an open enemy of my parents because of old political issues.” He lifted the pendant in his grip. “Does he give these out like trinkets, that just anyone would wear it? Or are they only for family?”

Nausea suddenly rose within her as she remembered the solemn occasion when her father had granted her the pendant on her sixteenth birthday.

And she thought about a frightened little boy, watching his parents killed, finding this same pendant.

“I put it in the purse on my belt,” he said, “not even realizing what I’d done. I never told anyone I had it, and years later, as an adult, I realized that if I’d have shown it to someone that night, it might have been enough proof to take to the king the accusation of murder against Martindale. So ’tis
my
fault he wasn’t punished then.”

Oh God, Adam even blamed himself for his parents’ murder going unsolved. She suddenly crawled away from the fire as her stomach heaved.

She returned weaker, tired, full of sorrow. She raised watery eyes to Adam, who watched her without expression. He was a man who’d spent his life waiting for vengeance. Did he even realize that?

“I—” Her throat seemed to close up. “I know not what you want from me.”

“Anything in your father’s behavior that might seem suspicious!” he commanded.

She gaped at him.

In a painful flash, she remembered caring for her ill father, his raving during the fever, the terrible secret he wanted no one to know. Had Adam’s parents discovered it? Would her father actually kill someone to protect an ancient family scandal?

But whatever had happened long ago, she had seen what guilt and bitterness did to a man. Would Adam become the same way?

She couldn’t let that happen! More than ever, she had to make sure Adam and her father never met at all, let alone attempted combat. Because if Adam realized he could not have justice, what would he do? Florrie felt as if fate had put her there, trapped between two men. She would save Adam’s soul—perhaps his life—by whatever means she could contrive.

But going against a man, even for his own best interests, was so very foreign to her. She had always been forced to go along with others, to be content whenever her life was altered on someone’s whim.

But now, looking at Adam, she felt a sense of power and purpose like she had never known before. She would save him.

Adam stared at Florrie, at her pale face and tear-filled eyes. She believed the evidence implicating Martindale, that much was evident. And it obviously hurt her to know such a thing about her father, regardless of how he had treated her.

And Adam hated to be the one to reveal it all to her. There was a sympathetic pain inside him that he hadn’t imagined feeling for her.

She rubbed her wet eyes. “I cannot imagine a reason that…someone would kill…your father, and especially not…your mother.”

“Someone?” he echoed. He heard his own bitterness, saw the way she flinched. But he had a right to be bitter; his parents were wiped away, his childhood destroyed by one man.

“Can you not say who it was, Florrie?” he asked softly.

“My f-father.”

And then she started crying, hiding her face as if embarrassed.

He suddenly felt like a monster. It wasn’t her fault, and it wasn’t his. They were only the innocents who had to suffer. He put Martindale’s pendant back in the pouch at his neck. And still she cried, her body so forlorn as it shook.

He reached for her then, and though she stiffened, he pulled her across his lap and put his arms around her. She collapsed against his chest and wept even more. He held her slight, trembling body and found himself kissing the top of her head, caressing her arms and back as if somehow he could make everything right between them.

But that could never be. A terrible murder stood between them.

She quieted at last, and he realized she’d fallen into an uneven sleep. He laid her back on the blanket, brushed a curl from her cheek, and regretted the wet tearstains he’d caused. Then he looked up and saw Robert at the edge of the clearing. His brother watched solemnly, which was so very unlike him.

Adam motioned for him, then pointed to the
blanket across the fire. Saying nothing, Robert came over and lay down, still giving Adam occasional searching glances. Robert must have heard much of it, and Adam felt bad about that, because Adam didn’t often speak so emotionally about what he’d seen when he was a child, what had given him nightmares for so many years. He hadn’t wanted to burden his brothers.

Paul had left before Adam could tell him the identity of their parents’ killer. Adam had been told Martindale’s name on his twenty-first birthday, but Robert had been nineteen, Paul eighteen. He’d thought them too young to know, too young to feel this desire for justice. In some ways he was glad he’d held it inside, for Paul wasn’t tainted with the knowledge. And Adam had tried to spare Robert, had wanted to do this alone, but Robert wouldn’t hear of it. And neither would Michael, who came from a long line of knights loyal to the Keswick earldom.

At last, he lay down behind Florrie and pulled her close against him. He thought
he
was comforting
her
, but he wasn’t even certain about that.

Deep inside him was a tight little feeling of dread. Could Florrie know something important—yet not realize it? Adam was not about to angrily confront her; that would solve nothing.

Talking would. He’d already begun to coerce her with words, with the exchange of the stories of their lives. Such persuasion would work on a softhearted woman like Florrie.

Because any other form of persuasion would cost him too much. He’d almost seduced her tonight, little caring that he had to remain alert for the men who followed them, that his brother was nearby, that Michael could return at any moment.

Florrie was like a fever in his blood, an obsession he was trying desperately to fight. And kissing her, tasting her mouth and her sweet response, touching her body—all of that had only made everything worse.

Yet he wanted to experience it all again, regardless of the terrible tragedy between them. He was so disappointed in himself. He was glad she knew the truth of her father’s crimes, for surely she would want to avoid any kind of intimacy with him.

If only he could link her with her father in his mind, but he couldn’t. She must be nothing like the man he’d grown up hating, the man he’d spent the last few years learning everything about. Florrie was kind to a fault, innocent, and Adam himself was the one trying to take her innocence away. Somehow, he had to stop himself.

He fell asleep leaving several inches between their bodies, praying that Florrie would know it was for the best.

Adam awoke before dawn to the sounds of Michael moving about camp, preparing for their departure. Robert was slowly rising, giving Adam a strange look—

And then Adam looked down at Florrie, who was once again curled up in his arms, facing him, her arms about his waist.

“The truth doesn’t seem to have changed her feelings for you,” Robert said softly.

“When she awakens, she will think differently,” Adam answered.

He shook her gently, and she moaned and burrowed closer.

“Florrie.”

Her eyes fluttered and opened, staring up at him. She searched his face, her expression confused, until her memories returned. The pain was there, but not as great. Now she looked sad, but as if she’d come to terms with it.

“Good morning,” she said, blushing a little as she sat up and disentangled herself from him. “I—I guess I have no control of myself when I sleep.”

He almost said he didn’t mind—but that would be encouraging her, and it wouldn’t be right to do that. He let her rise to her feet without his help.

“Is there a stream nearby?” she asked.

He shook his head. “We have enough wine and water in our skins until we reach another.” He glanced at Michael. “By midday?”

Michael nodded. “We shall travel west of Nottingham, almost into Derbyshire, rather than toward London. We’ll confuse anyone following us—and replenish our water supplies.”

Florrie nodded, then excused herself to go several paces into the forest. Adam remained nearby, and as she returned, she was startled to see him.

Understanding flooded her face. “Surely if the men following us had found us, they would have attacked?”

Adam shrugged. “We do not know their mission. We must remain cautious. You should keep your hood up from now on.”

She sighed. “I hope the weather does not become too hot.”

She lowered her gaze from him and went to her horse to open one of the saddlebags. She hadn’t been able to wash, so he wasn’t certain what she—

And then her chain and pendant dropped into the bag and disappeared. So she’d decided not to wear the crest of her family. It was not as if he could forget about it; perhaps she didn’t want to be reminded.

They began the day’s journey very cautiously, taking roads that seemed more like deer paths. They were constantly wary of being followed, and when they came upon another traveler, they spoke little.

It wasn’t until they stopped for a midday meal, in a field hidden from the road, that Florrie fixed Adam with an intent stare.

“Would you mind continuing the story of your childhood?”

He looked up from the dried apple pieces that he was eating. “I am surprised you want to talk about what Martindale’s crime led to.”

“I have always faced the worst things that happened,” she said simply. “I cannot exist by pretending everything is sunny. But even when bad things happen, I have to keep going on with my life, to make it the best it can be.”

Adam hid his amazement. Many other women would be denying the facts or too upset to talk about them. But Florrie was not like most other women. She made it so easy to admire her, reluctant though he may feel.

Michael glanced between them, shook his head, and went off to care for the horses. Robert lay on his side, propped his head on his hand, and listened with open curiosity.

Florrie felt hot with embarrassment, ill with sorrow—but she was also determined to understand the path Adam had taken because of the past. “So what happened to three orphaned little boys? Did other family members take you in?”

He shook his head. “We had no other family.”

She had been hoping for some happiness in his life. But he wouldn’t want her pity, though it burned in her chest. She waited.

When he looked into the fire, she had her first inkling of unease. He didn’t want to talk about this part of his life. Was it so very terrible? Or something else?

“If not family…” she prodded.

“My father’s friend, Sir Timothy, took us away to protect us. At that time, though some suspected your father, there was no proof, no motive.”

He gave her a meaningful glance, and she pretended she didn’t understand his subtle query about her father.

“And, of course, I did not know any of this,” he continued. “Sir Timothy became our foster father, and he treated us well.”