Jane Feather - Violet

Emotions under control again, he raised his eyes to her face and saw with a certain grim satisfaction that his scrutiny had discomfited her. There was less certainty in her challenging stance, and her eyes slid away from his. It was some recompense for his own unbidden response.

“Perfectly,” he drawled. “I find myself perfectly satisfied.”

Anger chased discomfiture from her expression, and she took a step forward so that for a second he thought she was going to strike him again. If she did, she would regret it.

Tamsyn read the message in his eyes and in the almost imperceptible readying of his body. The impulse to lash out at him died as rapidly as it had risen as she reminded herself that she was wasting time. Her plan was now fully formed, and engaging in this disturbing battle of wits was both futile and distracting. She turned without a word and walked to the edge of the high bank.

Julian watched as she stood poised above the water.

The back view was every bit as arousing as the front, he reflected dreamily. Then she rose on her toes, raised her arms, and dived cleanly into the swift-running river.

He walked to the edge of the bank, waiting for the bright fair head to surface. The water flowed strongly, and the rippling undertow was a wide band about five feet from the bank. A kingfisher flashed deepest blue as it dived into the swift surface and emerged with a fish sparking silver in the rays of the rising sun. But there was no sign of La Violette. It was as if she'd dived and disappeared.

His throat tightened in alarm. Could she have become entangled in the treacherous weeds he could see waving in thick dark-green fronds just below the surface?

Could she be swimming underwater to the far bank?

His eyes darted to the neat pile of clothes. They were still there on the ground by the rock. He'd taken care of that escape route. His eyes raked the surface of the water. There was nothing. Not a sign. How long since she'd dived? Minutes.

He was pulling off his boots, tearing at the buttons of his tunic without conscious decision. He flung his sword belt to the grass, yanked off his britches and his shirt, and dived into the river as close as possible to where he believed his prisoner had gone in.

He surfaced, teeth chattering in the icy waters that poured down from the snow-covered Sierra. No one could survive in this temperature for more than a couple of minutes. He stared at the smooth, unbroken surface of the river, shaking the water from his hair. Nothing. She'd disappeared as completely as if she'd never existed.

Again he dived, pushing through the forest of reeds, his eyes open, looking for a pale limb, a flutter of hair that would show where she was trapped.

Tamsyn surfaced on the far side of the rocks as soon as she heard the splash as he entered the water. She too was shivering with cold, her hair a dark, wet cap plastered to her head. But there was a triumphant gleam in her eyes, and a grin curved her blue lips. It had been a gamble that he'd go in after her without a moment's consideration, but her mother had told her many laughing tales of the so-called and frequently misplaced chivalry of English gentlemen. This English colonel was clearly no exception to the rule.

She leaped onto the bank, hidden by the rocks from the swimmer on the other side, and shook the water from her body with the vigor of a small dog. The sun struck warmly on her icy flesh as she darted sideways to grab up the neat pile of clothes.

Julian came up for air, numbed with cold, knowing that he shouldn't stay in the water another minute, yet forcing himself to go down for one more look. As he prepared to dive, he glanced toward the bank and saw a pale shadow against the rock, and then it was gone. It was no more than a formless flicker, but he knew what it was without even thinking.

His bellow of fury roared through the peaceful early morning on the banks of the Guadiana. A curlew screamed in imitation, and a flock of wild ducks rose from their nesting place in the reeds, wings beating in alarm as he waded through the water to the bank.

Tamsyn swore to herself and picked up her heels, racing across the flat mossy ground toward the small brush-covered hill. She didn't attempt to put on her clothes, simply clutched them to her wet bosom. It was sheer bad luck that he'd seen her, but she calculated she had enough of a start. He still had to scramble onto the bank, and she had to be fleeter of foot than a lumbering large-framed soldier.

Julian, however, had been a sprinter in his school days, and his long legs ate up the distance between them. He was running in blind fury, at himself for being so gullible, and at his quarry for making such a fool of him. He never failed at anything he set out to accomplish, and he wasn't going to be defeated in this instance by some flowerlike, diminutive, tricky, plundering, pillaging, mercenary bandit.

He was gaining on her, the icy river water turned to sweat on his bare skin, but she had almost reached the hill, and he knew that if she could attain the undergrowth, his chances of finding her were small. He and his men could beat the brush for hours, but he knew from experience how the guerrillas could disappear into this land without trace.

Tamsyn's breath was coming in gasping sobs now as she neared the rising ground. She could sense rather than hear her pursuer, his footfalls, like her own, were lost in the soft wet moss of the riverbank. But she knew he was closing on her. With a last effort she hurled herself up the slope, and then her foot caught in a sinewy tangle of thin roots creeping over the surface of the earth.

She fell to her knees with a cry of annoyance that changed to a shriek of alarmed fury as Julian hurled himself forward and his fingers closed over her ankle. She hadn't realized he was that close. Desperately, she kicked back with her free foot, but he hung on grimly, even when her foot bashed his chin. Her hands scrabbled at the sinewy roots, trying to get sufficient purchase to pull herself free, but he'd caught her other foot now and was hauling her backward, down to the flat ground. Her fingers slipped on the roots and she lost her hold, tumbling down as he pulled her, the bare skin of her belly and breasts rasping over the ground, pricked by twigs and tiny stones.

“Espadachin!” she raged, twisting onto her back, her fingers curled into claws, reaching for his face. “You're hurting me!”

“You'd make a fool of me, would you?” Lord St. Simon said furiously. “ Diablillo ! Crafty, tricky goddamned little monkey!” He grabbed her hands as they lunged for his face, wrenching her arms above her head, grabbing her chin with' his other hand, holding her head steady on the moss. “You'd serve me such a trick, would you? Let me tell you, mi muchacha , that it'll take more than a devious bandit to get the better of me.”

Tamsyn twisted her body sideways, trying to bring her legs up to lever against him, but he swung himself over her, straddling her, sitting on her thighs with his full weight so she felt hammered into the ground, arms and head pinioned, her body flattened.

“Espadachin!” she threw at him again. “I may be a bandit, but you're a brute and a bully, Colonel. Let me up.”

“No.”

The simple negative stunned her. She stared up into his face that was now as calm and equable as if they were sitting in some drawing room. He looked positively comfortable. She could feel the wet wool of his drawers prickling the skin of her thighs. He hadn't gone into the water stark naked.

Her astonished silence lasted barely a second; then she launched a verbal assault of such richness and variety that the colonel's jaw dropped. She moved seamlessly within three languages, and the insults and oaths would have done an infantryman proud.