Christabel heaved a teasing sigh. “It will be a pity, Reeve, when your 'scoundrel' falls. Once you trounce him, you’ll never find another full-grown man with the relish the two of you share for attempting to kill each other over a stupid ball." Christabel made a face.
"Stupid ball!” Reeve's gasp of outrage was cut short as, of her own accord, the mare turned down what looked to be merely wheel tracks branching off the road. The cart bounced across a huge rut, Reeve tumbling backward over the cart seat into a heap of flailing arms and legs.
Maryssa gritted her teeth, glancing yet again to the driverless horse, but Christabel, patently unconcerned, was already leaping to her feet in a swirl of pink satin. "Help me, Maryssa," she said, the lace at her breast fairly dancing with breathless laughter. "I shall never be able to haul this great hulk up alone, though it would serve the braggart right if the whole of Donegal saw him thus."
"Christabel, it is your fault I'm jammed in here in the first place," Reeve warned, his voice muffled in the frills of his shirt. "Maligning my hurling till honor demanded . . ." He gave a snort of indignation. "Help me at once, both of you, or I'll—“
Maryssa stumbled up, self-conciously taking hold of Reeve's wrist.
"Pull!" At Christabel's command, Maryssa tugged, but the second they tried to yank Reeve upward, he bounded to his feet with the agility of a frolicsome cat and caught both women in an exuberant hug. Maryssa tried to keep her balance, but the cart lurched abruptly to a halt and Reeve's momentum tumbled all three down into the cushions. Maryssa caught a blur of nearby faces silhouetted against a distant backdrop of trees, then yards of billowing pink fabric descended over her, blotting out the sky.
She struggled to push her way through them, but her over-skirt seemed hopelessly snarled in Christabel's hoops which were snagged on Reeve's waistcoat buttons. Maryssa's cheeks fired as she felt a buckram lath of her own hoop petticoat bob against her shoulder, the playful autumn breezes darting beneath its icing of morning gown to nip at the thin undergarments ruffled about her legs.
With stunned horror, she heard teasing voices calling out greetings to Christabel and Reeve from the cart's rim, inches from where they all lay sprawled. Maryssa groped vainly for the hem of her petticoat, the sounds of a brief scuffle followed by a yelp of indignation drifting through the layers of cloth. Then, suddenly, large warm hands clasped her waist, plucking her from the tangle as easily as if she were a spring flower. In one fluid motion her rescuer whisked her over the black-painted cart edge, turning her to face him as he lowered her to the ground.
She hardly dared raise her eyes from the wedge of bronzed chest framed in sharp contrast by the snowy lace that tumbled midway to the waistband of his breeches. But the well-muscled plane was so familiar, the touch of the hands still lingering upon her waist so sweet.
"Plague take you, man!" a gravelly voice from among the crowd pressing toward them complained. "You have had your arm about every pretty maiden from here to Lough Swilly. The least you could do is allow me to help this one from the cart."
"I would not dream of surrendering such a pleasure." The rich, silky tones drew Maryssa's eyes to meet Tade Kilcannon's intense green gaze. His eyes brushed downward to her lips, his hands, now hidden beneath the shielding of her cloak, drifted upward a whisper, the sides of his thumbs just skimming the undercurve of her breasts.
"Tade.” Maryssa breathed his name in a choked gasp, her gaze locking on the lean planes of his face. With a laugh Christabel leaped to the ground, Reeve's boot heels slamming into the turf beside her.
"I assume tedious introductions would be a waste of breath, Mr. Kilcannon?" Christabel's giggle tinkled on the breeze.
Maryssa saw a hint of red brush Tade's cheekbones. He opened his mouth as if to speak, but the delicate face brimming with merry insolence had already vanished in a whirl of powdered curls as Christabel whisked Reeve toward the clearing in a whirlwind of laughter. As if drawn by the ring of gaiety surrounding her, the crowd melted toward the field as well, each small group turning once again to their own jests, predictions, and wagers on the outcome of the day's hurling.
Maryssa stared after Christabel, unable to fathom either this woman who danced through life as though gifted with fairy slippers or the man, Tade, who remained at Maryssa's own side.
Daring a glance up at him, she found him searching her face with an intensity that made her palms grow damp. She swallowed, her voice quavering in her need to fill the weighty silence. "I wanted to thank you for returning my clothes last night. I—" She flushed scarlet as a bewhiskered old woman waddling nearby chortled, her faded brown eyes sparkling with humor within puffy folds of skin. "I mean from when I fell in the lake," Maryssa blustered.
“It was my pleasure." The words seemed to lodge low in his throat. "I waited outside on the ledge to make certain you were safe," he said quietly, his fingertip tracing the fading bruise along her jaw. "You have been, I trust. Safe, I mean."
Maryssa's fingers drifted in a self-conscious path to her cheek. "Yes, I've been quite safe. And how have you fared since . . ." She winced at how foolish she sounded, her cheeks staining berry red as her eyes locked on Tade's mouth.
The image of her wantonness as those warm lips had moved upon her flesh made Maryssa long to pull the ruched edge of her hood over her curls, to secret away both the shame and the longing that she knew must be evident in her face.
"Maura." The name fell like a caress from his lips. “It was all I could do not to bolt back through your window after your father had gone. I wanted to." Green, green eyes trailed past her mouth, breasts, and the curve of her waist. She saw him strain toward her, lips parted, the sinews of his throat standing out in sharp relief against the satiny bronze of his skin. But the sound of muffled tittering nearby made him turn and fix an exasperated glare upon the bevy of lissome peasant girls fluttering past them.
The prettiest among them flounced her skirts above trim ankles, flashing him a blinding smile. "You’d best be getting your mind on the game, Tade, lest they make a start with out you,” the girl called out.
"They'd hardly start without the greatest hurler since Finn McCool," Tade returned, tapping his chest with his fist with jocular arrogance. "And put your skirts down, Aileen Nolan. You've enough mud on your legs to fill MacConoughy Cave."
The girl yanked her skirts down, her face crumpling with the pettishness of a child caught playing in her mother's finest slippers. "Mayhap I'll be giving the mud to Sheena O'Toole," Aileen groused, her black eyes snapping as they flicked to Maryssa. "When she sees what you’re about again she'll probably fix to bury you in it."
"And if your ma knew you were mincing around with your skirts past your knees she'd lock you in the loft until you're twenty," Tade flung back. The laughter of the other girls as they skittered on toward the clearing drowned out Aileen's reply, but the name the girl had flung out echoed in Maryssa's mind, its implications reverberating through her like the tones of discordant chime.
From the moment Tade had plucked her from the cart, the eyes of every person about them had been filled either with arch speculation or with a sort of earthy indulgence, as though this same drama had been played out for their amusement time and time again.
Maryssa's whole body seemed ablaze with humiliation as her gaze locked on the ground, the delicate skin he had kissed beneath the lawn of her night rail burning as though he had seared it with a brand.
A man like Tade had no doubt had more than his share of amorous adventures. And it was patent to Maryssa that she had been added to his collection. It was as if Tade had cried his possession to everyone in the clearing, as though he wanted them all to know what he had done to her... what she had allowed him to do. And they accepted it as lightly as though she were a wench at one of the bawdy houses she had passed during her stay in London. Yet had she not acted the harlot? Drawing his lips to her breast?
"Maura?" At the sound of Tade's voice she forced an overbright smile, dragging the tattered remnants
of her pride about her battered spirit. She saw Tade's eyes narrow in confusion; then a smile tipped the corner of his lips. His arm slipped through hers with a tenderness that spoke more of cherished treasure than wanton plaything. "Come on," he said with a heart-stopping grin. "There is someone here who I wager will want to see you."
"See me?" Maryssa stammered.
"Aye. To thank you in person for saving her cursed fool neck the night Rath's troopers came."
"Deirdre?"
He didn't answer, merely drew her along beside him, as he called out greetings to the people they passed, pausing in his long-gaited stride to tug little girls' plaits, to tweak the nose of a lad of five playing at hurling with the crooked branch of an oak. "Ye goin' t' grind that bloody Sassenach into the dirt t'day, Tade?" the waif piped up eagerly.
"Aye, Owen. We'll teach Marlow to take the field against the Irish, eh?"
The child crowed with a glee unsullied by resentment or hate, despite the label of Sassenach he had placed upon Reeve. Maryssa gazed at Tade in a kind of dread-filled curiosity as she was struck by the child's tone—the innate loathing for the Irish people's oppressors had been oddly absent, replaced, instead by a kind of amused indulgence that surprised her.
"You and Reeve," Maryssa began, attempting to form her confused thoughts into words. "I mean, Reeve's English, but—"
"English?" Tade grinned. "Don't let anyone else hear you say that! They'll call me out for impeaching the blackguard's good name. His great grandda might have marched with Cromwell's army, but in spite of Owen's little gibe, the mountain folk consider Reeve, Christa, and all who live in Marlow Hall almost as Irish as themselves. Since the day the laws were passed forbidding Catholics to own land, the Marlows have held the estates of a dozen Catholics in trust for men who were once nobles in their own land. Old Dalton Marlow never filched so much as a farthing from a one of them, even when his own prospects soured. And Reeve, he's done as much for the people of these glens as any man could have. If my own da had given his holdings into their hands . . ."
Maryssa saw Tade's mouth twist in bitterness for an instant, and then all shadow vanished in a wicked grin. "Of course, even if Reeve Marlow were a candidate for sainthood—which I, as his closest and most abused friend, can assure you he is not—it would fail to save him from being— how did Owen put it?—'ground into the dirt' this day."
Tade wriggled his brows with such obvious relish that Maryssa bit her lip, trying to stem the tide of merriment suddenly threatening to burst forth as they neared the gray bulk of a boulder imbedded in the rim of the clearing. But at that moment Tide's own resonant laughter rang out. His arm swept around her waist, pulling her as tight against his side as yards of petticoats would allow. She leaned against him, reveling in the feel of his warm, hard chest shaking with mirth, his unabashed joy in life releasing something deep inside her.
“Look out you clumsy ox!" an irritated voice barked an arm's length from Maryssa's petticoats.
Marisa’s laughter died, her gaze darting to where two girls sat ensconced at the flower-ringed base of the boulder.
Deirdre Kilcannon jerked the hem of her petticoat from beneath the toe of Tade's boot. She glared up at Maryssa and Tade from beside a girl as gold and tawny as a prowling cat and half again as sly.
Maryssa peered but an instant into the girl's amber eyes, then turned her gaze quickly away, stunned to see resentment lurking beneath the long gold lashes.
"Look at what you've done, you disgusting beast!" Deirdre blustered at Tade. Clambering to her feet, she jabbed a finger at a smudge of dirt marring the sky-shaded calico of her gown. “It is the least you could do to watch where you place those great hulking boots of yours."
He grinned at his sister. "A thousand pardons, fair maid," he said. "But the sweetness of your voice and your gentle disposition so blinded me I didn't notice your furbelows were spread out halfway to Derry.''
"I doubt you'd have noticed if the pits of hell had opened up before you, the way you were making such a spectacle of yourself," Deirdre huffed. She cast a disparaging glance at Maryssa.
Maryssa swallowed, the joy that had kissed the bright afternoon vanishing. Guiltily, she attempted to ease away from Tade, but he only tightened his warm fingers on her waist, pulling her closer into the protective circle of his arm.
“Perhaps I was making a spectacle of myself," Tade said. “It’s a trait that seems to run in our family." His fingers swept soothing circles over the soft fabric shielding Maryssa's ribs. "But all in all it’s fortunate I nearly killed myself upon your skirts as you are the very person I was seeking. I was certain you'd like a chance to thank Maryssa here for all she did.”
"Thank her?" Deirdre's lips snapped taut. Her eyes shot daggers at Maryssa. "I am forever in your debt, Miss Wylder. Your footman managed to return the gown I loaned you so badly stained it will be fit for nothing but the rag bag."
"I'm sorry," Maryssa stammered, her cheeks flaming. "I'll see that you get another."
"Damn it, Deirdre." Tade took a menacing step toward her, the warmth of his arm falling away from Maryssa's waist. "If it weren't for Maryssa you'd probably be wrapped in a winding sheet instead of blathering about some blasted dress!"
"Tade's right, Dee." The voice was sweet as honeyed acid as the girl at Deirdre's side swept gracefully to her feet. "I know I shall be eternally grateful to Miss Wylder." One slender hand trailed a proprietary path down Tade's arm, stopping to toy with a button at his wrist. Maryssa fought the urge to slap the girl's fingers away, amazed at the sudden, fierce delight she took in imagining the shock that would round those slanted amber eyes.
The girl fluttered her lashes at Tade. "If anything had happened to you—any of you—I don't know what I would have done!" she cooed. “It was truly courageous of Miss Wylder to distract the soldiers. Why, think of how awkward it might have proved had she been discovered, what with Colonel Rath being such a close friend of her papa's."
"If Rath had thought her involved, she would have been in Rookescommon prison with the rest of us," Tade hissed under his breath, pulling his arm from the girl's grasp.
Red lips dipped into a seductive pout. "Aye, and wouldn't it have been terrible for Bainbridge Wylder's daughter to suffer so." The girl's words pierced a lull in the voices filling the clearing, the high-pitched tones reverberating through the trees.
"Sheena!" Tade gritted the warning from between clenched teeth, instinctively stepping in front of Maryssa as though to shield her, but it was as if the very sound of Bainbridge Wylder's name held the power to blanket the clearing with a smothering fog. A murmur rippled through the crowd, as quietly menacing as the prickling hairs at the back of a mastiff's neck. Maryssa shrank inside herself as the eyes that had been trained upon her with a kind of negligent indulgence clouded with suspicion and a very real loathing.
Yet, oddly, greater misery jolted through her at the memory of the golden-curled girl smoothing her hand across the muscles of Tade's forearm with the aura of a crowned princess beside her consort. Sheena, Tade had called her. The name the dark-eyed peasant girl had linked with Tade's own. Sheena O'Toole.
Warm and rein-hardened, Tade's fingers closed on Maryssa's elbow, but she drew away from him, a sudden sick feeling clenching in her stomach. She wanted to fly scratching into Sheena O'Toole's smug face, but Maryssa only raised her chin in aching defiance, feeling the eyes of every person in the clearing boring into her.
"It might shock you to know, Miss O'Toole, just how much a Wylder can suffer," Maryssa managed in a voice that quavered.
The girl smiled up at her, venom-sweet. "It might shock you, Miss Wylder, to know just how much suffering your father has caused."
They heard the clacking of clog soles striking the rocks that were strewn among the grasses, and then the rustling folds of pink satin swirled into view as Christabel Marlow swept to Maryssa's side. Looping one dimpled arm about Maryssa's waist, Christabel shot Sheena a killing glare.
"Since you seem so con
cerned about suffering at present, Miss O'Toole, perhaps it would be best if you and Deirdre took your seats on the other side of the field. As you well know, I always watch from the top of this boulder, and one can never tell when my clog might slip and bruise a most embarrassing part of someone's anatomy." Christabel gestured to the field, which was now full of men wielding hurleys. "It seems that, except for Tade, the men wait ready to play. Go settle yourselves."
Deirdre bristled, brows dipping low over her freckle-spattered nose. "But we were here first.”
"Perhaps it would be better at the other side, Dee," Sheena sniffed, puckering her face into a mask of blatant disapproval. "The air around here has grown distinctly unpleasant."
"As have certain dispositions," Christabel said, fixing Deirdre with a reproachful stare.
Thrusting out her lip like a belligerent child, Deirdre spun away, flouncing with the seething Sheena to a point across the clearing as far distant from Christabel and Maryssa as possible.
Clenching her fingers, Maryssa watched the girls' heads bob together, their unintelligible whisperings punctuated with nasty snickers as each sneaked glances back toward the boulder where Maryssa and Christabel stood.
Maryssa lifted her chin, what measure of budding confidence Christabel had managed to give her vanishing in the wake of Deirdre's cutting words and Sheena's waspishness.
"I swear, Tade," Christabel hissed under her breath. "If you marry that vicious hellcat you deserve to have your hide sliced to ribbons."
Maryssa felt a stab of some unnameable emotion twist in her stomach at the fleeting image Christabel's words evoked . . . Tade's long limbs entangled with Sheena's, her hair tumbling in disarray across his naked chest, the curled strands glistening like beaten gold in the light of a guttering candle. The defiant curve frozen on Maryssa's mouth wilted.
"I'd make any wench a poor husband at present, wouldn't you agree?" There was the slightest hint of brooding underlying Tade's voice as his eyes followed his sister's stiff back. Maryssa glanced at his face, then away, surprised at the veiling that hid the emotions that had played upon his face. He seemed to mentally shake himself, then turned to Maryssa, eyes crystal green with concern. A hint of a cajoling smile touched his lips as he sketched her a bow. "Would milady allow me to settle her upon her throne before the match begins?" he asked, feigning the solemn eagerness of a court swain.