Heart of Darkness Read online

  Isabeau's head shot upwards when she heard one of the men jump down from the saddle.

  "Who are you?" she called out, her voice husky from her exertions. Isabeau peered into the darkness but it enshrouded the rider like an all-encompassing cushion.

  Boots crunched fallen leaves as the rider approached.

  "The Night Rider," came the eventual response. It was definitely a man's husky voice.

  Whether it was fear or some other impossible to name emotion, his words had ripples of tension shuttling up and down her spine. The tiny hairs at her nape fluttered as she tried to calm herself down.

  "Why do you hunt me down as though I'm the fox and you the hounds? What right do you have?" she declared indignantly.

  The only response she received at first was a gravelly chuckle.

  "As both Wolfe Sinclair and the Night Rider, I have every right to hunt you down. You know why I seek you. Just as you know why I have been following you."

  Staring up at him with bewildered eyes, she felt anxiety strum her nerves to fever pitch. Isabeau had no idea as to why this man would be seeking her. All she did know was that she had been running to avoid a similar fate to that of her parents'.

  As far as she had always been aware, there had been no real or definite reason for her beloved mama and papa's deaths. Only supposition.

  But, was this man their murderer?

  By admitting that he had been following her, was he also admitting to the slaying of her parents?

  She damned her muddled brain's confusion as her thoughts were sluggishly processed and no answers, intelligent or otherwise, were forthcoming.

  With a tortured voice, she replied, "I do not know why you're following me."

  He laughed again and she winced at the harshness behind his tone. In her mind's eye, she saw the flames that licked at her family home. The thatched, straw roof smoldering as it was consumed by a fire to end all fires.

  The man behind the voice seemed capable of anything. Perhaps that was her fear talking, but then, what other emotion should she be feeling in so malevolent a situation such as this one?

  Wincing as she placed her scratched palms against the leaf-strewn ground, Isabeau shakily climbed to her feet and stood defiantly before him.

  "You killed them, then..." she stated quietly and was horrified when he laughed. The sound menacing in the darkness of the wood. She flinched at what she took for an admission of guilt and waited with bated breath for his reply.

  "Who haven't I killed? Your sheriffs would be most pleased to pin the majority of the unexplained deaths on the shoulders of my brethren and I."

  She swallowed, the convulsive movement adding to the nausea that had settled uncomfortably in her stomach. "That's no answer. Your evasion does not befriend you to me, sir."

  He sniggered. "And I am certain that if I treat you like the veriest maid, you would come running into my out-stretched hands. You have led me a merry chase, fair lady, but no more. You will return with me and mine to my land and submit as your kind should."

  "My kind?" she screeched, her anger lifting her voice to a higher than normal pitch.

  She could only thank the Goddess as the horses seemed to react to her screeching anger and they skittishly moved and jolted their riders. All of the thirteen horseman rushed to soothe their horses and she took the opportunity to flee their circle.

  Within five steps, she felt herself being hurtled to the hard ground and her head simultaneously being slammed against it.

  Grunting at the pain that rushed through her from both the hit to her head and the consequent heavy weight of the man's body landing atop hers, she wheezed, "Get off me, you brute!"

  Instantly, she was spun around and dragged to face him. The intimacy of the position was not lost on her and she struggled to move away from him, striking out with her hands and feet. Isabeau was only allowed this freedom for a few moments, until her hands were captured and her legs pressed against the ground with the weight of his own bearing down upon them.

  His hands slid upwards, along the length of her wrists and then suddenly, they were touching her fingers. A sharp zip of energy jolted her and her back arched upwards, so powerful was the strike. Breathlessly, she tried to shrug off his hand, but he wouldn't let her and Isabeau cried, "Let me go!"

  "Your glamor is of no use to me, fair lady."

  A sudden slash of moon light pierced through the canopy of trees and seemed to bathe them both in its pure luminescence. She stared up at him, saw the almost satanic darkness of his features and closed her eyes in terror, certain she was about to be raped or worse, murdered.

  His dark black hair appeared almost as stygian as the stone in her ring and it hung untidily about his face. A queue tied the majority of his hair back but the recent tussles with her on the forest floor had added a disheveled edge to his appearance. His eyes were hidden from sight by the night, but she just knew that they would be black. Devil's eyes.

  There was no gentleness in his face, no kindness, nothing that gave her hope of her safety and she slowly fluttered her eyelids open to face what was about to happen to her. She was no coward.

  The four years without her parents had been difficult, the most difficult of her life, but she had grown up, become an adult and she had learned to face whatever adversity life threw at her with bravery and courage.

  There was a lingering emotion in her eyes, did she but know it. It was pain from his continual touch of the onyx ring. She had never understood its powers and even to this day did not entirely comprehend how it aided her. But now, this stinging burn was enough to drive her mad. Sharp, gasping breaths escaped her lungs as it seemed to singe her flesh until finally he released her hand and subsequently the ring.

  Wheezing in relief, she licked her lips and turned her face away from him.

  "To deny the world your allure was an intelligent move, but during your stay at my stronghold, you will not deny me the pleasure of your beauty, sweet Venus."

  She resented the order, fiercely and glared up at him. "My talents are mine to command and not at your fingertips. You may think you have captured me, Night Rider," she spat. "But you are entirely incorrect in your pitiful assumptions!"

  "Ah," he said, and sighed musingly and seemingly ignored the rest of her tirade. "I notice your choice of the plural. Talents. What other tricks and sorcery do you have hidden then, I wonder?"

  "Enough to curse you!" she spat and struggled against his hold.

  "You must join the ranks, fair maid. You are not the first to wish me cursed and not the last to be satisfied at my current state. But you, on the other hand, dear lady, are the answer to my prayers."

  "Then you shall have to pray to the Goddess until your knees bleed! I shall never help you! Never!"

  Chapter Two

  With her teeth gritted and her jaw tensed against the anger that had her blood boiling, Isabeau clung to Wolfe Sinclair's body unwillingly as the thirteen horses tore through the forest at a speed that had her stomach churning nauseously.

  Off the side of the horse hung a huge crossbow, and if she’d only had the strength to lift and notch a bolt, she would have taken the weapon and shot him to gain her freedom.

  For what had felt like endless moments at the start of her journey atop the horse, Isabeau had shifted uncomfortably as she'd tried to absorb the jolting and swift canter of the horse's gait. Hating the feel of him against her, she had wanted nothing more than to put distance between them, but on a horse's saddle, it was rather impossible to place any space between them at all. As it was, she had been perched rather delicately against the leather seat. The cantle had dug deep into the fleshy mounds of her buttocks and had caused an ache all of its very own.

  When he had first tossed her into the saddle, Wolfe had hoisted himself up and sat in front of her, with the pommel at the apex of his thighs. As they had ripped through the woods with indecent haste, Isabeau had plotted and schemed as she attempted to find a way to escape the bastard, who was taking her to o
nly the Goddess knew where!

  Unfortunately, her only thought had been for that--escape.

  Not the injuries that would occur when she followed through with her mad plan, nor how she would manage to do so without causing a ruckus and garnering all their attention. Nor did she contemplate how she would manage to run from them when she made her getaway.

  She had been willfully blind in not seeing the many problems with her plan, as a desperation to break free from this man's imprisoning hold had taken her by the throat and caused her to act idiotically.

  In the end, she had been left with an even sorer bottom, an aching spine and a severely jerked neck and all for naught.

  Isabeau had simply noticed a sudden decrease in speed and had stupidly taken her chance. Releasing her arms from his waist, she had pressed her hands against the saddle and used that to give her momentum to jump off the back of it.

  She groaned to think of how painful a maneuver that had actually been and all of it pointless. As soon as her buttocks had connected with the hard, packed earth, Wolfe's horse and the rest of his troop had come to a halt. They had instantly known she was attempting to escape and the worst part of the entire indignity, was the fact that had they not noticed, she would have had to rest upon the loamy floor for an unknown period of time, so painful had it been.

  The hellish man had laughed at her predicament from his seat in the saddle, then had dropped his heavy weight the six feet to the ground and tossed her back atop the horse.

  The moment her posterior had clashed with the hardened and worked leather was one she would never forget. If sitting perched on the bouncing cantle was distressing, it was nothing in comparison to the pain that bolted through her bones after her failed escape plan. Agony had rippled through her as almost every single part of her had jolted and shuddered with the strain.

  When he had hoisted himself back on to the horse, this time, he had settled behind her. And so they had been seated for the last few hours.

  She was not entirely sure which position was worse. The last had been difficult, simply because it had inspired sensations in her breast that she had no right or desire to feel. Those rebellious and treacherous emotions had pushed her into her foolhardy plot.

  And even worse was the fact that she could not deny that the clasp of her soft, inner thighs to the hardened and muscled flesh of his outer thighs and hips, had stirred something inside her. Something that she had never before experienced and it had only worsened, as she leaned forwards for more support and her breasts rubbed against the lean yet sinewy breadth of his back. The peaks of her nipples had hardened and even as she had schemed to escape him, her cheeks had been tinted with the heavy rouge of embarrassment at the inappropriate emotions that had coursed through her.

  The man could have been behind the murder of her parents, for Goddess' sake.

  Although the thought had shocked her, rather than diminishing the insidious sensations, she had merely pushed herself to switch focus and her resolve to escape the man, who was intent on holding her captive, had trebled in intensity.

  Now, she found herself surrounded by him on three sides and Isabeau, despite repeated attempts to combat those perfidious and creeping emotions, found that her body was reacting to his proximity in ways that made her feel flushed and entirely outside of the parameters of her personal comfort.

  Throughout the long and tedious ride, she had had little choice but to take company with her own thoughts and the more she pondered Wolfe's reaction to her accusation, the more she believed that he wasn't behind her parents' murder.

  But then, that could simply be her subconscious trying to smooth over the fact that she found something about the beast attractive.

  Or it could be the truth.

  He had shown bitterness at her words. No signs of deception or guilt. Just a bitterness that he had been accused of something that he had not done. Surely, that would not be the case, had he indeed killed her parents. She bit her lip and wished that she was certain of the truth behind her parents' murder.

  When she realized that she was starting to revel in his fierce hold, her stomach began to churn anxiously. It was not normal to react this way, of that she was most definitely certain. A captor should be treated with disdain and distrust and hatred. Not a longing to taste his lips, or...She closed her eyes at the thought.

  Perhaps, she was far more disturbed than she had ever imagined. Mayhap, she belonged in Bedlam. Her reaction to this man surely proclaimed her as a bedlamite!

  To react to the arm that was clamped about her waist, the pressure of her spine against the uncompromising hardness of his torso, with anything but disgust was abnormal. Yet she did not feel disgusted. She felt surrounded by his scent and powerless to resist. As the horse jolted, the firmness of his manhood suddenly rubbed against her buttocks, yet she did not feel anxious or any repulsion. No, indeed. Her cheeks blossomed with color but for no negative reason. Exhaling roughly, she tried to fight the sway his body had over hers, but it seemed like an impossible battle.

  He was not aroused.

  No, that was her cross to bear.

  But he was not entirely unaffected, thank the Goddess. What was happening between them, the emotions developing between them, were shared, but rather frightening all the same. Isabeau realized that she was entirely unaware of how to cope with them. Of one thing she was certain, it would lead to bed and then to misery. More than likely on her part. Regardless of that, she found that she enjoyed hearing his reactions to her novice touch.

  Even in her innocent state, she recognized the changes in his body, when he inadvertently touched her or she him.

  His breathing became harsh and whistled past her ear, if she accidentally rubbed or clutched at his leg with her hand for support. It would become shallow if he brushed her breast with an arm, as he lifted it to point to one of his men. If her back and buttocks, aching from her fall, relaxed momentarily and she fell against him, he would tense and stiffen up.

  Even as unknowledgeable as she was, Isabeau recognized the signs and realized that perhaps, it was some atavistic instinct that all women possessed.

  It neither helped nor hindered her own dampened horror at reacting to her capturer in this primitive way.

  She jolted as his horse bucked slightly and her buttocks started to ache fiercely at this further bruising act. Relaxing as Wolfe calmed the horse and continued the indecent haste in which they cantered, Isabeau rubbed the onyx stone of her ring with her left index finger. As she did so, her mind focused on the pain in her hips and rear and slowly, a heat absorbed some of the ache.

  It was indeed a relief to be free from some of the pounding pain, but she wished for the morning to cure herself completely. Her powers had never been overly strong during the night hours. They were limited at best. As soon as the dawn broke, she would be able to entirely heal her ankle and the bruising to her behind. Had she taken her disguise of the old crone during the hours of light, then it would have been impenetrable. The clasp of another's hand to her ring would merely have strengthened the illusion of her disguise, not destroyed it as had occurred when Wolfe had touched the onyx stone.

  That still troubled her.

  She could explain it away with the truthful fact that her powers were diminished in strength during the night, but there was something else, something that eluded her at this moment in time.

  "Is there a reason I can feel your buttocks heating up as though you have taken a seat in a pile of glowing embers?"

  His gravelly and textured voice sounded loud in her ear and she felt the small hairs there and at the back of her neck stand on edge. She had to fight the urge to shiver and only managed to do so, because he would either believe it to be her body's natural and unstudied reaction to him. Or, he would believe her to be cold and perhaps would wrap her even tighter in his arms and she would be surrounded all the more with his scent!