He had retribution to lay upon Magdalena and her full lips and defiant eyes. He touched his hand to the finger she’d broken and smiled faintly.
She would not escape. She was alone in a foreign land and her only friend was an outlaw he was about to smash open, quite literally. She would be found. She was too magnificent to disappear entirely. And there was nowhere she could go. She knew no one in this entire realm.
No, he would have his revenge on the bitch who would not let him beggar himself to get what she’d given away so freely to the Irishman.
But the trap was laid. Tadhg would come for her. And Sherwood would be waiting.
MAGDALENA slid off the haystack, limping from the impact but not injured. Cold winter air blew over her, shockingly cold against her flushed skin. Barefoot, she flew through the courtyard of the inn, splashing through puddles, then stopped just inside the gate that lead to the streets, her back against the wall of the inner courtyard, outside the shine of torchlights.
Had Sherwood been correct? Had her desire for adventure blinded her? Had passion once again ruined her? Had hope, once again, been a terrible, black-hearted lie?
Had Tadhg abandoned her?
She sunk to her knees, coldness spearing through her. She folded her arms around her knees, ready to succumb to the winter all around her, and in her heart.
A pale pink of sunrise began to spread, every so faintly, over the buildings.
Chapter Forty-Five
TADHG WAS EXHAUSTED. And triumphant.
The dockmaster had indeed been a master, not of docks and quays, but of information, and messengers. While the Frenchmen slept of their drunken stupor, he’d called upon his redoubtable resources of men and information, and in the early morning hours, the message had gone out, by multiple riders, using multiple routes. The earl of Huntingdon would be contacted. He would come.
Given a choice as to which adjective fit his current disposition more neatly, Tadhg would choose exultant by a bowshot.
He peered up the darkened street to the Dove’s Inn, and saw firelight burning through one of the shuttered windows on the second floor. Maggie was awake then, waiting for him.
He’d hoped that she would not even know he’d been gone. Now she must be worried. No matter, he would explain, tell her the good news, maybe have her bath refilled so he could take her in it, then tomorrow, begin their final westward trek to—
He stopped short at the sight of soldiers stationed at the door.
Sherwood’s soldiers.
Standing boldly and with no attempt at disguise, it was as if they wanted him to know they were there.
To know Sherwood was inside…with Maggie.
A red-hot, black burning, blinding rage came over him. Years in the coming, it unleashed now, turned him into a typhoon of hard intent, a storm with no purpose but rescue and destroy. He had no dagger, he had no mission in life beyond protecting Maggie. He was an arrow aimed at her, and nothing would stop him from getting to her. Certes not three soldiers standing like a couple of jackeens at the door.
He loosed a pent-up roar of rage and launched himself at them.
UP IN THE BEDROOM, Sherwood looked up from the fire.
“He is here.”
DOWN IN THE COURTYARD, Maggie heard the roar of rage, and scrambled to her feet, calling for Tadhg, but he did not hear her over the sound of his own shouts, then the shouts of the soldiers, then everything descended into madness.
Chapter Forty-Six
TADHG ERUPTED on the soldiers like a funnel of fury, unsheathing his sword and sweeping it in deadly arcs, to and fro. It sliced through the belly of the first man. He opened his mouth to scream but the sound never made it out for he toppled over, dead.
Tadhg spun and met the sword thrust of a second soldier, knocking him backward. He reeled away into a third who’d rushed forward and they stumbled together, tripping each other up.
The hostler came running out from a back room, shouting, then Sherwood came down the stairs, flanked by two more soldiers.
“Tadhg,” he said in his voice of utter calm. “How good to see you again.”
Tadhg lifted his sword and pointed it at the baron. “Where is she?”