Champion of the Heart (23 page)

Someone had to pay for those memories haunting his dreams. He’d lost his father that day. And now Vaughn would lose something just as precious. His wife.

Yes. Fox stood up. He would take Vaughn’s wife from him and make her his own. It was unfortunate Jordan had to be mixed up in their battle, but so be it. Vaughn had to pay for what he did.

Fox stormed through the field toward Castle Mercer. He would marry Jordan and make her his wife. Her lands would be his. He didn’t give a damn how she felt. He couldn’t let himself give a damn about how she felt. That road was far too treacherous to follow. He didn’t care that she didn’t want to be with him as his wife. He knew he couldn’t care about what she wanted for his father’s sake, his brother’s sake, the sake of the Mercer family. He couldn’t let himself care at all.

He entered the castle, moving through the downpour of rain through the outer ward, the inner ward, and finally into the Keep. His decision played itself over and over in his thoughts. It was his only chance to regain what he had lost. He approached the meal room, ready to announce his intentions to Jordan.

When Fox entered the room it seemed unnaturally quiet. He noticed his hound, Doom, near the wall. The dog lifted its head to gaze at Fox but did not rise. The animal seemed to gaze at him with reproach, but Fox knew that was ridiculous.

Fox turned his gaze to the table where Beau sat. His friend stared at him with narrowed eyes, as if in disapproval, and then swung his look to Jordan. Beau bowed his head and shook it, his gestures mirroring the same condemnation Fox saw in Doom’s eyes. Now what have I done? Fox wondered. But deep down he knew. He had treated Jordan badly. Even if she had deserved it, dragging her down a hallway intending to toss her into the dungeon had been no way to treat a lady.

Fox swung his gaze to the hearth. Jordan sat before the cold fireplace, a blanket draped over her shoulders. In her hands, she cradled a mug of ale. Her shoulders were slumped slightly and her hair drooped down to touch her lap.

Fox halted as she turned to gaze at him. She rose and came toward him. She looked weary and sad, so very sad. Fox knew she had not slept from the rings beneath her eyes, eyes that were full of sorrow and remorse.

“Fox.” The word came from her lips softly, full of repentance. “I shouldn’t have endangered your family. I shouldn’t have endangered your friends. I never should have sent those notes.”

Guilt filled Fox. Where others, even Doom, would cast blame on him for his shameless actions, for his fit of rage, Jordan took responsibility for the incident herself.

His plans immediately evaporated before him as he looked into her troubled face. One second. That’s all her doe eyes needed to make him forget himself, forget anything else he thought he so fervently desired. There was so much pain in her eyes. How could he force her to marry him? How could he hurt her like that and live with himself? How could he sentence her to a life of misery with him when all he wanted to do was make her happy?

She opened her mouth as if to say something, but suddenly Pick raced into the Great Hall, skidding to a halt just before Fox. “Mary Kate is missing,” the big man panted.

Fox scowled at him. Fox impatiently brushed a drop of rain from his eyes, waiting for Pick to go on.

Pick continued, ”She didn’t sleep with Scout last night, and Scout hasn’t seen her all day.”

Great. The one day Scout showed any interest in her daughter was the day the girl disappeared. “Find her,” he ordered his men. They sprang into action, forming search teams.

Fox looked at Jordan for a moment, urgency filling his gaze. She stood forlornly before the dark hearth. It could never be between them, he knew suddenly. With that thought came a sense of great loss and great anger. He looked away from her.

“Go,” he said. “You are free to go. I can’t bear to look at you like that.” Once the words were out of his mouth, he regretted them. But there was no time to take them back, no desire to keep her caged.

He raced out of the meal room without a glance backward. He had to concentrate on Mary Kate, had to find her. An even bigger storm was threatening.

Then why did he feel as if his heart was being wrenched out of his chest?

***

Jordan stood at the hearth, gazing after Fox with her jaw agape. Go ? she silently wondered. Go? He was releasing her. Go! She could go to her children! She ran toward the door, but then halted at the threshold. She would never see Fox again. Such a great sense of loss filled her that she didn’t take a step for a long moment.

But I have to go. I have to make sure my children are all right.

She ran to the door of the Keep. The sun was setting, the darkness coming. The rain had lessened, but the clouds were still very dark above. In the distance, an even darker mass of clouds appeared to be heading their way. She would be crazy to leave the safety of Castle Mercer now, risking robbers and highwaymen and the approaching storm. But did she really have a choice? What if Fox returned and changed his mind? What if he didn’t let her go? Would that really be such a bad thing? Yes, she quickly answered herself. Yes, it would. I have to get back home.

Jordan squeezed through the opening of the Keep just in time to see Fox thunder past on his great black stallion, racing toward the outer gatehouse. Jordan watched him go, feeling forlorn and lost and so very alone.

She wanted desperately to be here when Fox returned. After all, he did want to marry her. No, a voice inside her said. He doesn’t want to marry you. He wants your lands, your title. He even said he couldn’t look at you anymore. He doesn’t want you. He doesn’t need you. And you don’t need him.

She had to leave now, before she lost something far more important than her lands and title -- her heart.

With that, Jordan set out from the castle, moving into the forest beyond.

F
ox’s horse pranced anxiously beneath him. He had to force the animal to move slowly with firm yanks on the reins as his gaze swept the empty hilltop, searching for the child. Lifting a hand to his mouth, he yelled, “Mary Kate!” His own echo was the only response.

He had searched narrow trails in the forest, across muddy paths, but found nothing. No broken branches to mark her direction, not even a single footprint. It was as if she had vanished.

He heard the echoes of Pick calling out to Mary Kate, but there was no response from the child. He cursed Scout for the hundredth time. She should have told him immediately about Mary Kate’s disappearance. She could be hurt.

It wasn’t like the little girl to venture out of the castle. Fox couldn’t remember the last time she had taken more than a dozen steps beyond the castle walls. She usually only came out with her big branch to help cover their tracks when they returned from an outing, and that was about the extent of her ventures into the world.

She was only a child, for the love of God. How far could she have gone? She had to be around here somewhere.

Frustrated, Fox reined in his horse and headed back toward Castle Mercer, wanting to try a different direction. Why would she have gone out alone? he wondered again. They had actually searched the castle again quickly before heading outside in case she had been hiding, but they had not found her, nor any hint of which direction she might have headed.

Lightning flashed, and Fox cursed again. The damned rain that had plagued the land the night before in torrential downpours was threatening again. That was all he needed. He decided to move closer to the village. Maybe someone there had seen something.

His thoughts tried to drift to another female out alone in the dark beneath the threatening sky, but he refused to let them linger longer than a moment on Jordan Ruvane.

***

Jordan moved quickly through the field outside of Castle Mercer. Thunder rumbled overhead, and she glanced up. The sky was dark, and blackened clouds churned above her head. The grass was still wet from the previous night’s rains, and the dampness clung to her dress, slowing her down, as if the forces of nature were trying to hold her back.

She glanced back at Castle Mercer. She wished she could have made Fox believe she wanted to make sure her children were all right, but he wouldn’t listen to her. All he wanted was the lands and his title.

She certainly shouldn’t care about him. After all, he said he couldn’t stand to see her. Then why did she feel this empty ache in her chest? Why couldn’t she erase the sadness encompassing her? Why couldn’t she forget him?

She hung her head. Fox thought she had turned her back on him, abandoned him. He despised her. Yet he hadn’t locked her in the dungeon when he could have done so. What had made him stop? Maybe he did care for her. Maybe he did have feelings for her that were not full of anger and hate and hurt.

Why? Because she wanted him to have those feelings? Because she had feelings for him? Because she wanted those warm feelings she had for him to be given to her in return?

Jordan entered the forest. Her feet were soaking wet, her slippers heavy with mud and leaves. She pushed on, knowing the farther she got from Castle Mercer, the closer she would be to her children.

She wanted to help find Mary Kate, but this might be the only chance she got to see her own children. And they needed her. Fox would find Mary Kate. She would be fine.

Jordan shoved her way through the thick tangles of branches, moving toward the path she knew was near the river. Could she find it before it became too dark to see?

Thunder boomed above and a jagged tail of lightning lit up the trees around her.

Jordan increased her pace, trying to run. She slipped on the wet earth and went down on one knee. When she rose, her hand was slick with mud and her knee was caked with the wet dirt. She wiped her hand on a nearby tree.

Another spear of lightning lit the forest and cast odd shadows all around her. For a brief, mad moment she feared the woods might be as haunted as local gossip said the castle was. Thunder followed the hot light almost immediately.

Jordan pushed on. Ahead the river rumbled. She was almost at the path. She pushed urgently through the trees, and some of the gnarled branches snatched at her, catching in her long hair, as if nature herself was still trying to hold her back.

But Jordan pulled through them, tearing them away from her, desperate to reach the path before she could no longer see it in the deepening darkness. Surely she could get a ride from a passing merchant, maybe even get to the children before morning.

Lightning lit the sky again, forming a bright halo of light on the ground. This time, Jordan didn’t look up. She kept her attention riveted on the forest, memorizing the way ahead in the momentary burst of tight.

The rush of the river sounded close by, much stronger and more ferocious than she remembered. It had rained fiercely the night before. The water was probably much higher than normal.

Thunder boomed, rocking the ground beneath her feet

She slipped again in her hurry.

And fell flat on her stomach right onto the path. A sense of profound relief filled her. She glanced down the sodden, muddy trail and broke into a tired smile. Jordan rose to her feet.

But she froze as she heard a faint cry over the rush of the river. She paused, glancing around, wondering for a moment if she heard anything at all. She took a step down the path.

The cry came again, distant but unmistakable. A cry filled with fear. A child’s cry. It had come from near the river.

Mary Kate.

Jordan glanced down the path that would lead her to her children, and then toward the child’s cry. With a muttered curse, she made her decision.

T
he child’s cry came again, this time much closer.

Jordan pushed past the bushes near the river’s edge. Lightning speared the sky, illuminating the rushing river. A strong current churned down the river. Then the light faded and the night fell once again.

“Mary Kate!” Jordan shouted above the rushing waters.

The scream came again from Jordan’s right. She turned to look for the girl, but the darkness was thick and consuming. “Where are you?” she shouted.

“Help!”

Jordan rushed forward, following the voice, almost tripping over a splintered tree in her frantic haste to get to the child.

“Help!”

Jordan followed the fallen tree toward the river. Its end was well in the rushing water. But what caught Jordan’s attention was a small head barely visible above the water’s surface. Mary Kate lifted a hand toward Jordan, but then slipped. Her face went under the rapidly moving river.