The Maiden's Hand

His barb hit home with a sting of unexpected pain. She tried to look imperious. “Sir, I am insulted. Unhand me.”

He bent low to whisper in her ear. “I could free you, Lark. I could teach you to soar.”

Heat swept from her toes to her nose, and she could not suppress a shiver as his warm breath caressed her ear. Alarmed, she broke away and stepped back. “I do not want you to teach me anything of the sort. I simply want help with a certain matter. You have refused to listen. You have dragged me from pillar to post on a fool’s errand. If you will not help me, I wish you would tell me now so I can be shed of you.”

“You wear outrage like an angel wears a halo.” He sighed dramatically, then lounged against a stone hitch post.

All her life she had been taught that men were strong and prudent, endowed with qualities a mere woman lacked. Oliver de Lacey was a reckless contradiction to that rule. Furious, she marched blindly down the road. She hoped the way led to the river.

With easy strides he caught up with her. “I’ll help you, Mistress Lark. I was born to help you. Only say what it is you require. Your smallest desire is my command.”

She stopped and looked up into his sunny, impossibly wonderful face. “Why do I think,” she said, “that I shall live to regret our association?”

“I cannot understand why you agreed to this,” Kit Youngblood muttered to Oliver. He glared at the prim, straight-backed figure who rode in the fore. They were on the Oxford road leading away from the city, on an errand Oliver had embraced with good heart. The ride was enjoyable, for he loved his horse. She was a silver Neapolitan mare bred from his father’s best stock. Big-boned and graceful as a dancer was Delilah, the envy of all his friends.

“Keep your voice down,” he whispered, his gaze glued to Lark’s gray-clad form. He had always found the sight of a woman riding sidesaddle particularly arousing. “I owe her my life.”

“I owe her nothing,” Kit grumbled. “Why drag me along?”

“She needs a lawyer. For what purpose, she has yet to disclose.”

“You know as much about the law as I do.”

“True, but it would be unseemly for me to practice a profession.” Oliver feigned a look of horror. “People might think me dull and unimaginative, not to mention common.”

“Forgive me for suggesting it, Your Highness. Far better for you to follow your lordly pursuits of drinking and gaming.”

“And wenching,” Oliver added. “Pray do not forget wenching.”

“How did the woman know where to find you?”

“She went to my residence. Nance Harbutt directed her to my favorite gaming house.”

“Hunted you down, eh? And what have you done to the poor woman? She’s barely spoken since we left the City.”

“I took her to Newgate Market.” Closing his eyes, Oliver recalled the rapt expression on her small, pale face when he had set the birds free. “She loved it.”

“You’ve ever been the perfect host,” Kit said. “I do not know why I put up with you.”

“I wish I could say that it’s because you find me charming. But alas, ’tis because you’re in love with my half sister, Belinda.”

“Hah! Faithless baggage. I’ve not heard from her in a year.”

“The kingdom of Muscovy is not exactly the next shire. Fear not. She and the rest of my family will return before long.”

“She’s probably grown thin and sallow and peevish on her travels.”

Oliver chuckled. “She is Juliana’s daughter,” he reminded Kit, picturing his matchless stepmother. “Do you really think such a lass could grow ugly?”

“I almost wish she would. Suitors will be on her like flies on honey. She’ll take no notice of me, the landless son of a knight. A common solicitor.”

“If you believe that, then the game is up before it’s started. You—” Oliver broke off, scanning the road in the distance. “What’s that, a coach?”

Lark twisted around in her saddle. “It looks as if it’s gotten mired.” She made a straight seam of her mouth. “You would have noticed minutes ago if you had not been so busy yammering with Mr. Youngblood.”

“Mistress Gamehen,” Oliver said with a smile, “one day you will peck some poor husband to the bone.”

She tossed her head, the dark coif fluttering behind her. With a squeeze of his legs, Oliver guided his horse past her to investigate the distressed travelers.

The boxy coach had been traveling toward town. Rather than being pulled by big country nags or oxen, it was yoked to a pair of rather delicate-looking riding mounts. Curious.

Behind the coach was a bridge spanning a shallow, rocky creek. Apparently the conveyance had cleared the bridge and become stuck in the muddy berm at the roadside.

“Hello!” Oliver called out, craning his neck to see into the small square window. He waved his hand to show he had no weapon drawn, for travelers tended to be wary of highwaymen.

“Are you mired, then?” he shouted. No response. He drew up beside the coach, frowning at the horses. Indeed they were not draft horses. Smallish heads indicated a strain of Barbary blood.

“Hello?” Oliver twisted in the saddle to send Kit a quizzical look.

The coach door swung open. A blade sliced out and just barely caressed the nape of his neck.

“It’s a trap!” Oliver dismounted, drawing his rapier even before his feet hit the ground. Kit did likewise.

To Oliver’s dismay, Lark leaped out of her saddle, lifted her skirts and rushed toward the coach. Three men, wearing the tattered garb of discharged soldiers, swarmed out. From the grim expressions on their faces, they seemed bent on murder.

Oliver flourished his sword and feinted back from one of the soldiers, a bearded fellow. “I say!” Oliver parried a blow and sidestepped a thrust. “We’re not highwaymen.”

His answer was a wind-slicing front cut that slit his doublet. A bit of wool stuffing bulged from the tear.

A feeling of unholy glee came over him. He loved this feeling—the anticipation of a battle joined, the lure of physical challenge.

“You’re good,” he said to the bearded one. “I was hoping you would be.”

Danger always had this effect on him. It was a battle lust he had learned to crave. Some would call it courage, but Oliver knew himself well enough to admit that it was pure recklessness. Dying in a sword fight was so much more picaresque than gasping his last in a sickroom.

“En garde, you stable-born dunghill groom,” he said gleefully. “You’ll not have the virtue of this lady fair but with a dead man’s blessing.”

The soldier seemed unimpressed. His blade came at Oliver with raging speed. Oliver felt the fire of exhilaration whip through him. “Kit!” he yelled. “Are you all right?”

He heard a grunt, followed by the sliding sound of locking blades. “A fine predicament you’ve gotten us into,” Kit said.

Oliver fought with all the polish he could muster under the circumstances. He would have liked to tarry, to toy with his opponent and test his skills to the limit, but he was worried about Lark. The foolish woman seemed intent on investigating the coach.

The soldier came on with a low blow. Like a morris dancer, Oliver leaped over the blade. Taking swift advantage of the other’s imbalance, Oliver went in for the kill.

With his rapier, he knocked the weapon from the soldier’s hand. The sword thumped into the muddy road. Then Oliver whipped out his stabbing dagger and prepared to—

“My lord, are you not a Christian?” piped a feminine voice beside him. “‘Thou shalt not kill.’”