The More I See You (12 page)

Jessica studied him silently for a moment, then she shook her head. “I appreciate the offer. I imagine it really would be a sacrifice for you.”

He frowned. It sounded like a compliment, but somehow
he suspected there was something less than complimentary about what she’d just said.

“But you can’t help,” she finished.

“And you cannot return to Merceham by yourself,” he said. “Or perhaps you have forgotten your last encounter with my brother?”

“I’ll just avoid him.”

Richard shook his head. “Know you nothing of England, lady? Even with scouts as poor as his, he would know within minutes that you had set foot on his land. And I can assure you, his welcome would not be something you would enjoy.”

“I have to try,” she said, and to his mind she sounded overly stubborn about something that seemed completely absurd to him.

“To return home by frequenting Merceham? I cannot understand what difference that makes.”

“It makes a difference. Trust me on it.”

He pursed his lips. “After you have stolen my horse three times now, once from under my very backside? You’ll forgive me if I am less than eager to trust you.”

She sighed deeply. Richard was relieved to see she was seemingly becoming aggravated. That was much easier to tolerate than a trough full of tears. He had the feeling that her tears were an unusual occurrence anyway. He’d seen her under very trying circumstances and not once had she resorted to them, as he’d seen other women do. Perhaps she was more troubled by being away from her home than he’d thought.

“Look,” she said, “I’d tell you that I’d just walk, but that wouldn’t be honest because I don’t think I’d make it all the way to Marcham, or Merceham, as you call it, intact.”

“In this much at least, we are in agreement—”

She looked behind him and sighed lightly. “Well, I suppose I won’t be going anywhere now. It looks like your guard has come along.”

Richard cast a look over his shoulder at the guard in
question. They’d taken their bloody sweet time about reaching him.

“I guess you’ll want your horse back now,” Jessica said.

“In a moment,” Richard said. There was no time like the present to chastise those who were supposed to be guarding his life. He dropped the reins to the horses and walked toward his men that he might more fully glare them into shame. He reminded himself as he approached that he was indeed grateful enough for their discretion and their protection, though at the moment he was hard-pressed to produce any feeling of affection for any of them, especially his captain, who was wearing that smirk again.

“What?” Richard demanded.

John merely shook his head and smiled. “She rides very well.”

“What?” Richard turned to see his horse’s rump now far in the distance. “
Damn
that woman!” He glared at his guard. “Go home, the lot of you. You’ve been no help to me thus far. I can’t see how you can help now.”

They didn’t argue. Richard mounted his borrowed horse and turned it toward Merceham. He could hardly believe Jessica had made off with his mount yet again. It would be the last time, if he had to tie her up and haul her back to the keep himself.

And he would have his answers this time. He had no idea why she was so fixed upon returning to Merceham, but ’twas a foolish and shortsighted idea. Wherever her kin were, they could be sent for. His earlier offer aside, he truly did
not
have time to escort her to Hugh’s, nor did he have time to guard her whilst she went about her business. She would just have to come home with him.

Assuming he didn’t have her drawn and quartered—which he wouldn’t, of course, for ’twas a messy business indeed, though it was powerfully tempting—for yet again making off with his mount!

Jessica kicked Richard’s horse into a full-out gallop. Behind her she heard a faint “
damn
that woman!” and knew her chance to get ahead of him would be short-lived.

The time, though, had come to stop messing around and get down to business. She
had
to get back to Merceham and the only way to do it was to get there on a horse. Maybe she could outride Richard all the way there, hop off his horse, and be back in New York before he could strangle her.

She studiously ignored the fact that it had taken three days to get to Burwyck-on-the-Sea. That was different. They’d been riding slowly. She was going to ride very fast.

She kept telling herself that even as she heard Richard’s curses coming increasingly closer, carrying with them, no doubt, a very annoyed medieval lord. At least he wasn’t whistling anymore. She wasn’t sure she wanted another flight over his horse’s head.

She saw him draw alongside her and held tightly to the reins. She wasn’t sure how he intended to stop her this time, but it wouldn’t be because she’d been stupid enough to let go of the wheel, as it were.

And so it took her by complete surprise when she saw him make a flying leap from his horse to hers. She was even more surprised to find he hadn’t knocked both of them off. The reins became a moot point, because apparently all it took to communicate his wishes to his horse was a knee or two in the ribs.

She felt him relax and she turned to put her hand in his chest to push him off.

“Do not,” he growled. “That will not work with me a second time!”

He jumped down and didn’t give her much choice but to dismount right along with him.

“Why do you continue to do this?” he demanded. “Have you no sense at all?”

“It’s a long story—”

“Hugh won’t leave enough left of you to return home, I can assure you of that,” he continued, as if he hadn’t heard her. “I am past fathoming why I care what happens to you. It must be concern for Horse. Aye, that’s it.” He reached out and patted his horse for good measure.

Jessica rubbed her hands over her face and wanted nothing more than to curl up with a nice blanket in front of a warm fire and have a very long nap. There was no way to explain her situation without having Richard think she’d lost her mind. Just trying to come up with a good beginning was almost too exhausting to contemplate.

“’Tis obviously a womanly preoccupation you have with this idea,” he announced. “Perhaps you can be forgiven for not being able to think on something else.”

“Think on something else?” she echoed. “There
isn’t
anything else to think on!”

“You don’t need—”

“Don’t,” she said, gritting her teeth. “Don’t tell me what I need. You don’t know the first thing about it.”

He frowned fiercely at her and she wondered if he might be considering the possible outcome of strangling her. Then he seemed to master that impulse, because he only pursed his lips and appeared to be mentally counting to ten, not a hundred.

“I have a thought,” he said, sounding as if he were summoning up all the patience he possessed. “Why don’t you tell me your sorry tale.”

“You wouldn’t believe me if I told you.”

She could have sworn she could hear his teeth grinding.

“After the se’nnight I’ve just passed,” he said tightly, “I am nigh onto believing anything. Tell me how you came to be on Hugh’s land.”

“You’re sure?”

A muscle began to twitch in his cheek. Jessica took that as a good a sign as any.

“All right,” she said. She took a deep breath. She could hardly believe she was about to spill her guts to a medieval baron while standing in the middle of a field with two panting horses for company, but maybe she shouldn’t have been surprised by anything. She never should have accepted Archie’s invitation. She could have been sitting in her nice, roomy warehouse of an apartment pounding out some Bach on her piano. She could have been sipping Red Zippy tea and contemplating what to have for dessert. She could have been wearing warm socks instead of a pair of Richard’s tights that seemed to want nothing more than to pool around her ankles.

But all that would have meant missing out on even just the sight of the irritated man standing in front of her scowling ferociously.

There was something almost charming about him when he scowled.

She put her hand to her forehead. Too much time traveling had obviously had an adverse effect on her common sense. What she needed was a rich accountant who would work lots of overtime and leave her alone to compose on the eleven-foot Grotrien he’d bought her to put in her custom-built music room.

A man who couldn’t listen to her without patting his sword every now and again as if he intended to use it on her if she took too long was not the man for her.

“Your tale,” he prompted.

“Yes, well,” she said, wondering just what he would
believe and how far she should go before she found herself being used as kindling. She took a deep breath. “Actually, I was standing in a friend’s garden trying to get away from a man I had been dating—”

“I knew it,” he said grimly. “I knew there was a hapless fool involved.”

“Well, thanks so much for the vote of confidence, but the hapless fool was me,” she replied crisply.

He grunted, but didn’t say anything else.

“Anyway, as I was saying, I was out in the garden, trying to find some peace, and I decided that what I really needed was a gallant, honorable knight to carry me off on his white horse. So, I wished upon a star.”

He blinked. “You wished upon a star.”

“Yes. One minute I was in the garden, wishing for someone with a little chivalry to come along, and the next moment I was standing in your brother’s fields.”

He pursed his lips. “Then your wishing went awry. You certainly found no chivalrous soul—”

Don’t sell yourself short
, she started to say.

“—in Hugh,” Richard finished.

She was somehow not surprised that Richard didn’t think himself in the running. Perhaps he had a better idea of his shortcomings than he thought.

“Yes,” she said dryly, “you’ve certainly got a point there.”

“But how is it that you went from the garden to Hugh’s fields? Were you so consumed with your looking into the sky that you didn’t mark the distance you crossed?”

Jessica shook her head. “I didn’t walk anywhere. I was just standing there. One minute I was in one place, the next I was in . . . ah . . . another,” she finished, realizing she had probably just said too much. It certainly sounded wacky and who knew what Richard would think of it. She hazarded a glance up at his face.

She’d never in her life seen anyone look more skeptical. He shook his head slowly, as if it had just been confirmed to him that she was several peasants short of a full work crew.

“That’s not the half of it,” she said, pressing on against her better judgment. “But I don’t think you’d believe the rest of the story.”

“I don’t believe
this
much of the tale,” he said.

“Then you really won’t believe the rest. And even if I tell you the whole thing, you’ll probably either toss me in your dungeon or burn me at the stake. And I’d really rather avoid both.”

“Are you a witch?”

“No.”

He looked at her closely. “Are you an outlaw?”

“No.”

He grunted. “I knew that was too easy an answer to the riddle. Very well, if you are neither of those things, then what have you to fear from me?”

“You aren’t exactly shy about giving in to your temper.”

“And if I vowed to keep it in check?”

“I don’t think you could.”

“Damn you, Jessica, I demand you give me the tale!”

“See?” she said.

He took a deep breath, releasing it very slowly. Then he looked at her again.

“Tell me,” he said calmly. “Nothing, and I vow I mean that truly, nothing you say could possibly surprise me. In the space of less than a se’nnight my life has run afoul of more trouble than I saw in ten years of warring, and you have much to do with that. You’ve stolen my horse three times and fair ruined him for battle. He wants nothing but to eat and be petted. You obviously have no concept of how a castle is when run properly, so I can only assume the rest of your tale will be equally as hard to swallow. But I will attempt it. Go on, while the blood pounding in my head has quieted enough to allow me to hear your words. Go on,” he said, gesturing for her to do so.

“You’re sure?”

A muscle twitched in his cheek and he had to take
another breath before he answered, but he sounded calm enough.

“Aye. Give me the tale.”

“You asked for it,” she muttered under her breath. Maybe telling him the whole story wasn’t such a bad idea. He would probably think she’d lost all her marbles and he’d be so glad to get rid of her that he’d take her to Hugh’s and put her on the time-travel train himself.

She hitched up her hose and drew a long straight line in the dirt. She made a hash mark at the left end.

“This is the birth of Christ. The Year of Our Lord Zero, right?”

He nodded, his eyes flicking from the line to her face and back down again.

She made another hash mark near the middle of the line. “This is the Year of Our Lord 1216, when John Lackland, son of Henry II died. Right?”

He nodded again, more slowly this time.

She made another mark. “This is the current year. What is it?”

He looked at her sharply. “1260.”

“Right. 1260.”

She looked back at the line and gathered her courage. Then she made two more marks toward the right end of the line. She didn’t dare look at his face.

“This is the Year of Our Lord 1971,” she said, pointing to the first mark. “And this, this last mark is the Year of Our Lord 1999.” She lifted her eyes and looked at him. “I was born in 1971. The day you rescued me, I had been standing in the garden of a friend of mine and the year was 1999.”

He looked down at her line, up at her face, then turned and walked away. She watched him stop, rub the back of his neck, and stare down at the ground. He stood like that for several minutes, then he walked away a little more, stopped, and assumed the same pose. Jessica didn’t even think about trying to make off with his horse again. After having been witness to his leaping from one moving beast to the other, she was almost convinced there was just no
way to outrun or outmaneuver this man. If she got to Hugh’s, she would get there because he wanted her to.