Chapter Fifteen

Chapter Fifteen

Samira poured the tea for herself as well as  her mother and her mother-in-law, who were sitting across from her in the Marston parlor. They waited in silence, hardly even looking at each other. Samira had emptied her stomach already that day for the third morning in a row; the stress of Evangelina’s kidnapping was getting to her. Samira wasn’t prepared to think about other factors, to have the joy and the anticipation, the nerves and the wonderings, that might have come with anything else.

“They’ll be back any minute,” Deirdre said, just to say something.

Samira was grateful for that. She could not handle the silence. Her mother had been almost entirely silent since they had told her about Evangelina’s kidnapping. Samira had worried that her mother would cry, rend her clothes, but now, her daughter could not help but think that might have been better. Whatever place Patrice Acharya had retreated to inside herself, it was unreachable to her eldest daughter. Samira loved her mother with an abiding ferocity, a protectiveness that would never fade, but there were pieces the women had that would never belong to each other. In some ways, it had always been the love of Evangelina that drew them, and then held them, together. Patrice loved Samira, of course, and had always done right by her, but Samira had learned to stand on her own so that she could support Patrice and Evangelina, so it had not been the same.

“Of course,” Patrice answered softly.

They were waiting on the return of Rowan and his brother-in-law, the Marquis of Conway. The men had gone with the evidence procured from the Earl’s safe to try and convince the police to issue a warrant of arrest for Claymore. Samira tried to be optimistic, but justice did not seem to be well served through official systems. She had built her life on such a principle; it was the reason she had seen some kind of justice when she stole from the aristocracy. Now that she was one of them, Samira was chafing against the confines of their version of rules, rules they broke when they saw fit but used to protect them and keep down those they did not consider their own.

The doors swung open and the sheer presence that came with Rowan and Conway was enough to entirely shift the atmosphere of the room. Samira had not known them then, but the two of them had been rakish youths together, bonding over wild antics and outlandish reputations. There was an extreme degree of masculine capacity in the both of them, and Samira felt that she could almost smell it like an expensive and delectable cologne. It was sharp enough to cut through the haze of uncertainty she felt, though not enough to dispel it to any degree.

“Samira,” Rowan said softly. “Can you step out here a moment?”

Samira rose from her seat, glancing over to Patrice and Deirdre, whose worried expressions told Samira they feared the same as she. This was not good news. As she stepped into the hall on the heels of Rowan and Conway, Samira met Rowan’s gaze. He only shook his head. Her heart stuttered in her chest, and she damned any sense of hope that had managed to rise only to be dashed.

“I’m sorry. They said it’s not enough,” Rowan explained, closing the door halfway behind them and speaking in a hushed whisper. “They’ve said they’ll send someone to ask him a few questions when he returns to town, but…”

Samira’s shoulders sagged, her stomach roiling. She clutched at her belly, and Rowan was by her side in an instant.

“I am so sorry, my love,” he whispered, wrapping his arm protectively around her.

Samira screwed up her face, grimacing with all the fury coiling up inside her. “I should have let you kill him that night in the garden.”

Rowan’s jaw clenched, and he pressed his forehead to hers. “I should have done it anyway.”

“It has always been this,” Samira hissed. “He has always been in the protection of his rank and his name. He and all those like him who can do as they wish, hurt who they wish, because they have a title!”

“I know,” Rowan stroked her hair. “I know, and I’m so sorry.”

Samira dropped a head onto his shoulder. “I hate it. I hate him. I want my sister back.”

Rowan wrapped his arms around her. “I know, my love.”

She breathed him in, the familiar scent she’d fallen in love with the first time she’d stepped into his study. It was small comfort, but his arms, strong and capable, were reassuring.

“You need to rest, my dear,” whispered Rowan. “Shall I take you upstairs?”

Samira gave the smallest of nods, and Rowan scooped her up, carrying her as her arms wrapped around his neck.

“Conway, can you–”

“I’ll speak to your mother, let her know what happened,” said Conway. “Call on me with anything you need.”

“Thank you,” said Rowan.

As Rowan mounted the stairs with his wife in his arms, he felt every bit of his uselessness. He couldn’t protect even his own family, couldn’t spare the woman he loved this kind of pain. It was a bitter pill to be shoved down his throat, so clearly forced to swallow one’s own limitations, and it turned his stomach. There was far too much injustice in the world, and far too much that could not be controlled. He could not spare Samira such pain, and when she gave him children, it would be more of the same. They would scuff their knees. They might be bullied, have their hearts broken. They might lose someone they loved or, God forbid, die themselves. The world was a great, unfeeling, uncontrollable place, and as Rowan carried Samira into their bedroom and shut the door, he wished it were that easy to truly shut the rest out. There, between them, they had something true and something pure. If it could only be that, for eternity, all would be well.

Rowan laid her down on the bed and kissed her cheek, feeling her skin soft and sweet and cool against his lips. Samira looked up at him with those fathomless eyes as he stood up.

“Rowan, please,” she whispered.

“What is it?” he asked. “What can I do for you?”

Samira’s lips parted, letting out a breath. “Oblivion. Only for a moment. Please.”

Rowan let his own breath push from his lungs in a sharp exhale. That, at least, he could give her.

There was little to do in the carriage except reflect on her situation with a kind of removed misery. The horrid juxtaposition, the perfect memories of the night turned painful with the dawn, gnawed at her like a persistent ache. What if their first night together was also their last? And she would be cursed forever with the memory of beauty and truth, only to be denied it for the rest of her days. Like Mnemosyne, she remembered every moment of it, the experience etched into her soul. The touch of his hands, creator’s hands, shaping and making her, bringing her to life as he sculpted her frame. The feeling of his tongue trapped between her thighs until she begged him for something she couldn’t name. The ultimate truth of having him share her body.

It made her hot and cold at once, shiver and quake from the inside out. Evangelina knew she had been remade when they’d made love; somewhere in herself, she’d always known it would be this way, and she thought he had as well. Perhaps that was why it had been so long in coming, that Zeke had known just as well as she that there would be a before and an after, and standing on that precipice frightened them both.

“Are we slowing down?” the Earl’s voice boomed in the confined space.

He had stopped bleeding, and Evangelina scowled at the wound, wishing she’d opened up that gash in his heart. She stared at him, wishing him dead, willing him dead. And finally, promising that one day, he would lie dead at her feet. If nothing else, she would watch the light of life die in his eyes, and count it justice for all his crimes. Evangelina was glad to feel anger, relished it, and if it was the only emotion that ever returned to her, she would treasure it.

They came to a full halt then, the Earl letting loose a string of profanities until the door was swung open by Magnus.

“Why the hell have we stopped?” demanded the Earl.

“There’s an inn just ahead,” Magnus explained. “We can go inside and get cleaned up. Ye can tend to yer wound and Evangelina can–”

“There’s no time for that, you idiot!” growled Claymore.

Magnus fumed, but he bent his head and pushed down the feeling, whatever he had wanted to say. Finally, he looked up again at his father.

“She canna wed like that,” Magnus waved his hand at Evangelina.

Evangelina felt numb to her core, listening to the conversation about her, watching the volley back and forth like a badminton game, and with about as much interest. What did it matter how she wed? She had no say in the matter anyway, on what it was like, let alone who it was to, or even if she was willing. Zeke might be dead. He likely was dead, and it was her fault, and now, she was being sold like livestock.

“She’ll wed however the hell I tell her to,” snapped the Earl.

“Macrannock wilna like it,” Magnus said.

The Earl snorted. “He won’t give a damn.”

Magnus tried again. “They’ll take one look at ye and her and know she’s no standing at that altar – be it in a church or over a blacksmith’s anvil – voluntarily. Scotland might have marriage laws a wee bit more lax than England, but they dinna smile upon forced weddings. Not any longer, at least. It isna the days of the clans.”

The Earl scowled. “Fine. But we’ll stop once we’re over the border while we wait for Macrannock. Not before. If any of that Marston brat’s friends are about…”

“I’ve taken a different route,” Magnus said. “A wee bit more circuitous, but we’ll make it to the spot in plenty of time, even wi’ a stop. And they willna be looking here. I ken the roads in and out of Scotland better than anyone, aye?”

Claymore’s command came out in a snap. “Get her out then and get her cleaned up. Mrs. Jenkins!”

The woman leapt into action then, snatching Evangelina’s wrist and yanking her away from the carriage. They staggered out, the full daylight blinding Evangelina as she stepped out into it. They crossed the innyard and she spied a young man, maybe twenty, with a pockmarked face and wide, brown eyes as he caught sight of her.

“Help, please!” Evangelina begged.

Mrs. Jenkin’s bony fingers dug tight into Evangelina’s flesh.

“Please!” Evangelina’s voice grew louder, more urgent. “Please, sir! Help me!”

The boy, wide-eyed and nervous, dropped his head and hurried along. Mrs. Jenkins scoffed.

“I told you, girl,” she snarled. “No one wants to help the likes of you. You’re lucky you’re getting wed to some rich Cit. Some of us have to work to stay alive.”

Evangelina wanted to spit. Instead, she dug her heels in. Mrs. Jenkins nearly tripped when her charge halted so abruptly. The woman rounded on Evangelina.

“Walk, girl.”

“No,” answered Evangelina stoutly.

Mrs. Jenkins’s gaze turned even more hawklike. “Excuse me?”

“I won’t walk. I’m done helping you kidnap and sell me,” snapped Evangelina.

“What the hell is going on here?” demanded the Earl, barging in toward the women, wielding all his height and girth like a weapon.

“The bitch won’t walk,” said Mrs. Jenkins.

“What have I told you about cooperating?” snapped the Earl. “And the consequences of not doing so?”

“I have cooperated!” cried Evangelina. “And what has it gotten me? I’ve been beaten and brutalized, sold off to another man and attacked when I was with my true husband. And he has been…he’s been…”

She couldn’t say it. She didn’t know what to say. He’d been shot…was he hurt? Dying? Worse?

“Perhaps I’ve been far too lax if you think what’s been done to you was a beating,” the Earl grunted.

Evangelina just jerked her chin in defiance. The Earl took that as invitation and brought his hand up in a swift uppercut, snapping her jaw together and her head jerking back.

“Enough!” Magnus’s voice bellowed across the courtyard.

Evangelina’s ears rang. She knew she was provoking the Earl, but she didn’t care. Whatever she did, whatever it cost her, she was done making this easy on him.

“What did you say to me, boy?” snapped the Earl.

“Leave her alone,” Magnus stalked over.

Evangelina was finding it hard to focus, everything fragmented around her. The people, the places, the memories, all bleeding together. There was Samira and her mother there, Rowan teaching her to dance, and Zeke’s kisses in the moonlight, there were sweets from her childhood on her tongue and the scent of magnolias from Samira’s soap in her nostrils.

“A fine time to say that now,” chuckled the Earl. “What the hell has gotten into you?”

“You’re done hurting her,” said Magnus stiffly, reaching out to grasp Evangelina’s shoulder, the touch grounding her.

“On whose orders? Yours?” Claymore guffawed. “Boy, you are my son. You live by my grace. You don’t get to give orders.”

“Nonetheless,” Magnus stood his ground.

“In fact,” the Earl marched on with his point, disregarding that Magnus had even spoken. “I am the one who gives orders. Now, teach the little whore a lesson.”

“Excuse me?” demanded Magnus.

Evangelina could hardly even muster the energy to care about what they spoke of; everything that had happened, everything that would happen, it did not matter. She’d fight with everything she had, and whatever that got her, she would accept. Evangelina had tried everything but  the pure obstinance, bravado, and defiance of a child in the throes of a tantrum, so that was what the Earl would now get.

“Teach her a lesson,” said the Earl slowly, as though Magnus had not comprehended the words. “I don’t care if you break her bones or beat her until she’s black and blue. Teach her a bit more respect like I taught you.”

There was a beat of silence passing between them, a tangible thing.

"I wilna do it."

Every iota of focus in Evangelina that had previously been sent a hundred different directions snapped back to one central point. Magnus.

"What did you say?" growled the Earl.

Magnus squared his shoulders and faced his father. "I wilna be part of this anymore."

Before Evangelina could even register what had happened, a fist snapped out and the blow caught Magnus directly in his nose. He rocked back but didn’t budge, blood pouring from his nostrils. Evangelina felt a little queasy at the sight, and no small degree of empathy for the man – her brother.

"D’ye really think, after all these years, a clot to the heid is going tae change my mind?" demanded Magnus, yanking off the rumpled neck cloth and using it to staunch the blood.

"Ungrateful bastard," snarled the Earl. "You will do as I say."

Magnus took the bloody cloth away and stared his father in the eye. "Go fuck yerself."

Then he turned on his heel and marched off, leaving Evangelina behind. It hardly even registered in her mind as she watched what was really her last hope walk away. Evangelina had no options, save one, and she clung to it. She would make it her mission to be as noncompliant as possible. What happened to her now mattered less than simply making sure it was as difficult as could be to make it happen.

With decision, Evangelina let her legs go lax, and her bottom hit the ground. She sat there, closing her eyes and ears against the Earl’s tirades until he picked her up bodily and lumbered her inside. Evangelina hoped it hurt his wound. She hoped it reopened and he bled out on the floor of his chamber. The Earl deposited her in a room that had a steaming tub and left her behind with Mrs. Jenkins, who began to strip Evangelina.

She might have fought the woman on this, too, but a bath sounded absolutely heavenly on her aching body. Mrs. Jenkins yanked Zeke’s coat off of Evangelina and held it pinched between two fingers like it was a dead rat.

“Covered in blood,” the woman clucked. “Gruesome. Wash yourself.”

She flung the coat down on the bed, and Evangelina saw the red stains covering it. On the front, the blood that was on her face and hands, that was the Earl’s, but on the back, the stains of blood were Zeke’s. He’d been shot, and he’d bled onto the coat he’d wrapped around her, to protect her. And Evangelina saw there an older stain, a few drops of red blood dried and brown, and her knees went weak. She dropped her body onto the cloth and buried her face against the fabric, a sob she didn’t know she was capable of wracking up from the rend in her soul, clutching the place his blood and hers mingled.

“What the hell are you doing?” snapped Mrs. Jenkins. “Wretched girl.”

Mrs. Jenkins grabbed Evangelina’s arm and hauled her away from the bed, the fabric slipping from Evangelina’s grasp. But she let it go.

Zeke couldn’t be dead. Evangelina was suddenly sure as she’d felt his blood on her skin, that if had gone from the earth, she would know. They were now bound in the deepest, truest way humans had ever known, and Evangelina could feel the presence of him in her very soul as he had been in her body. Zeke would not be permanently parted with her so easily; he would hold on for her, and she would hold on for him. As long as there was life, there was hope, she reminded herself. Evangelina could not let herself drown in emotion, nor could she go so numb she couldn’t do anything. She had to fight, and seeing his blood and hers comingled there had jarred her into that knowledge. She thanked the gods that it had.

Evangelina slipped down into the water, the heat seeping into her depths. As Mrs. Jenkins scrubbed her with nearly violent officiousness, Evangelina realized the water took from her the last traces of Zeke on her skin. His scent, his seed, lost to soap and water. Her hand fell to her stomach. Maybe she was carrying his child; maybe, and the universe could not be so cruel as to bring a child into the world fatherless when such a man who would be such a wonderful sire could have been there.

No, Evangelina decided, letting her hand fall away. She did not want to be pregnant now; she wanted the chance to become pregnant. She wanted Zeke, wanted the days in the future when they would make their children together. She wanted a thousand thousand more nights in his arms, wanted the product of their love in her belly when they were safe and together, forever.

A maid knocked and entered the room, bringing with her a bundle of clothes. “Here mum.”

“You may go,” said Mrs. Jenkins as she tossed the sponge back in the water. Then to Evangelina, “Out, girl.”

Evangelina stood up reluctantly from the water. Her body already felt a bit better, her mind seeming to clear a bit. She wrapped herself in the towel offered her, and she dried herself. Whatever was to come, Evangelina would feel better doing it fully clothed. The dress, it turned out, was the palest of greens, with cotton undergarments, and a pair of sturdy but clumsy shoes. In all, it was far from a work of art, but it would do. Likely it was all that was had by whatever woman had given it. Evangelina wondered if the Earl demanded it or paid for it. She thought the former, perhaps with a few coins tossed down, nothing to make up for the cost to these people who lived in the country and had little, and access to less.

“Fine,” said Mrs. Jenkins as she finished braiding Evangelina’s hair. “That’ll do. Let’s get a move on.”

Evangelina then moved back to obstinance, and she sat on the bed, crossing her arms over her chest. “No.”

When Mrs. Jenkins tried to drag her, she sat on the floor. When at last, the Earl came in, he slapped her for good measure, and Evangelina did not even react. He hauled her up and drug her bodily, finally enlisting the help of the burly innkeeper to take his “recalcitrant daughter” to the carriage. The man more than happily obliged, and Evangelina was once more shut inside, this time with some village lad driving the carriage that would take her across the border and to whatever fate, with someone named Macrannock, that awaited her there.

“We should have caught them by now,” said Lord Cartwright firmly as they slowed their pace to be able to speak to one another.

Nathaniel clenched his jaw. Worry struck through Zeke; Nathaniel hadn’t disagreed. Zeke had thought the same, but he had found himself terrified to vocalize it.

“Regardless of the route, we are planning for the same destination,” said Nathaniel, clearly attempting to sound sure when he was not. “We will intercept them in Gretna even if we don’t meet them on the road.”

Zeke had started to feel a bit better on the course of the ride. His whole body ached, and the pain had perhaps worsened, but he had drank some water and eaten some food, albeit on horseback, and it made him feel stronger. The focus on pursuing his Evangelina, too, was enough to put fire back in his blood.

Suddenly, a movement off to Zeke’s left caught his eye. “What’s that?”

All the men turned to look, and a redheaded figure stepped out into the road, waving his hands over his head. “Ho!”

The redheaded man, the one who had been with the Earl of Claymore and had absconded with Evangelina. He was now sporting a bloodied nose that didn’t quite look broken, but could not have felt good.

“Might be a trap,” hissed Lieutenant Cartwright.

Nathaniel nodded, and they slowed. “Who are you?”

“Magnus Mackenzie,” the man said. “I come in peace.”

The men slowed to nothing, finally stopping a few feet from him. Zeke rested his hand on his pistol, not taking any chances. This villain was a tall man so that he did not seem to truly have to crane his neck to look up at mounted men before him, which was slightly unnerving.

“What do you want, Magnus Mackenzie?” demanded Nathaniel.

“I want tae help ye get Evangelina back,” said Magnus flatly.

There was a long moment where no one spoke. Zeke’s head spun, his heart thundering in his chest, his pulse beating in his arm.

"Why the hell would we believe you?" snapped Lord Cartwright.

"She’s me sister," said Magnus.

Zeke exchanged a glance with Nathaniel.

"You’re the Earl’s son?" asked the Lieutenant.

Magnus nodded. "He sired me wi’ a woman who wasna his wife. Yer bride and I have something in common that way as weel."

"Indeed," agreed Zeke. "But she was still your sister when you kidnapped her."

Magnus’s head dipped slightly. "She was, and I am sorry for it."

"Then why did you do it in the first place?" Lord Cartwright questioned.

Magnus rubbed at his forearm, almost an unconscious motion. "Have ye no ever wanted to please yer father? When the man was unpleasable? I wilna excuse my actions, but they did seem right at the time, though I ken better now."

Nathaniel looked over to Zeke. “Well?”

Zeke swallowed hard. He didn’t know what exactly made him answer this way; it was instinct, it was a belief that had become part of him over years of experiencing the breadth of humanity, that this man could change for the better and see the good. If anyone could shift someone’s worldview, it was Evangelina, with her sweetness and strength, so Zeke had to believe that had happened for Magnus Mackenzie.

“I say we keep an eye on him, but we follow,” Zeke said.

Nathaniel nodded. “You heard the man. Let’s go. Take us to her.”

Magnus moved swiftly, retrieving his horse from the trees and mounting up. “They’re going to Gretna, but if we hurry and go this way, we can get there before them and intercept things. It’ll be close, but we can do it.”

“Lead the way,” Nathaniel gestured.

Magnus spurred on his horse, and Zeke urged his own faster, matching pace with the Scotsman’s steed. Magnus’s eyes slid over and met Zeke’s.

“Ye are cautious,” said Magnus. “That’s wise. Yet yer instincts are strong, to see a good thing when it comes before ye.”

“I certainly don’t trust you,” Zeke clarified.

Magnus nodded. “Aye, that’s good too.”

They lapsed into silence as they rode for a while. Suddenly, Magnus spoke again, and it nearly knocked Zeke out of his saddle.

“Ye canna kill him,” said Magnus.

There was no question as to the “him;” it was the man Zeke had been fantasizing about ending the life of for weeks now, since Rowan and Samira’s engagement ball. It had been a disturbing fantasy, one at odds with everything he believed about the world, but one he could not let go of.

Zeke snorted. “I will absolutely not promise that.”

“Not in the heat of battle, I dinna mean,” Magnus clarified. “If tae get yer wife back, ye must end his life, then he’s made his bed and must lie in it. But ye canna kill him in cold blood, aye?”

Zeke eyed the man that, he realized, was his brother-in-law. “Why? Haven’t you just betrayed him? Why do you still protect him?”

Perhaps calling the man who was helping them a traitor was not the most tactful thing, but Zeke was far beyond tact. Magnus scowled, but he answered.

“He is me father,” Magnus said. “I hate him sometimes, to the marrow of his bones and my own, but he’s my blood, my sire. I canna deny that in him any more than I can turn me back on it in Evangelina. D’ye ken?”

Zeke nodded. “I think I might.”

“So, will ye promise?” asked Magnus. “Give me yer word as a gentleman?”

“Will you refuse to take us to my wife if I deny you my word on this?” asked Zeke.

“No,” Magnus shook his head. “I shall take ye, no matter what. She doesna deserve what’s coming to her, and nay do you. But I will ask ye, as a man to a man, a son to a son, please spare him, if ye can.”

Zeke lowered his eyes. “If I can.”

Magnus nodded slowly. “I think ye may deserve her.”

Zeke looked over at him sharply. “What?”

“I dinna ken Evangelina well,” said Magnus. “But she is quite the lass. She is verra good, and verra strong, and I think it wouldna be right for her to be with a lesser man. You, I can see, arena such a lesser man.”

Zeke only nodded in response.