To Taste Temptation (Legend of the Four Soldiers #1)(77)
Author: Elizabeth Hoyt

Now, after riding with Mr. Thornton and his foul-smelling henchmen, she wasn’t sure she’d made the right decision. He still might kill them both once they reached the wharf. She’d been contemplating making an attempt at leaping from the carriage for the last several minutes. Unfortunately, she’d have to make it past the brutes first, and that was without considering the gun pressed against Rebecca’s side. Emeline had not a smidgen of doubt that Mr. Thornton would pull the trigger out of spite if nothing else. The man was quite, quite mad. How he had hidden his affliction up until this point was a mystery, because he was a bundle of ticcing nerves now. Mr. Thornton grinned and winked every few minutes, the expression becoming more like a grimace each time.

“Almost there, ladies,” he said now, again winking in that horrible way. “Ever been to the East? No? Well, most haven’t, I suppose. What a grand adventure we’ll have!”

The man to Emeline’s right grunted and shifted, the movement releasing a terrible odor from his scarlet coat. The carriage was rattling into the east end of London, the way lined with warehouses. Overhead, the sky outside was becoming progressively darker.

Emeline clutched her hands together in her lap and tried to make her voice even. “You may let us out here, Mr. Thornton. There really is no need to take us any farther.”

“Oh, but I enjoy your company so much,” the nasty little man cackled.

Emeline inhaled slowly, then spoke quietly. “Our presence only serves as a reason for Jasper and Samuel to continue pursuing you. Let us go and you may escape.”

“How kind of you to consider my welfare, my lady,” he replied. “But I think that your fiancé and Samuel Hartley will pursue me whether or not I let you go. Mr. Hartley in particular seems quite obsessed. I’ve had my eye on him”—he nodded to the scarlet-coated thug beside her—“from the moment I heard that he was questioning all of the survivors from our regiment. So, all things being equal, I think I’ll keep your sweet company.”

Emeline met Rebecca’s gaze. The girl hadn’t said a word since they’d been forced into the carriage, but in her eyes, Emeline saw the same despair that threatened to overset her own sensibilities. It made no sense at all for Mr. Thornton to have kidnapped them, and the very senselessness squeezed her chest, making her breath come short.

Outside, the rain started, as sudden as a curtain falling at the end of a play. She needed to think, and the time they had might be short.

She very much feared that Mr. Thornton meant to kill them.

THE SKY OPENED up and rain poured down in a drenching torrent. Sam flinched as the first wave hit him like a slap in the face, but he kept running. The rain actually made things a little easier. Those who could immediately sought shelter, fleeing from the streets as fast as they were able. Unfortunately, that still left quite a few vehicles. The brewer’s cart, for instance, probably still blocked Vale’s carriage. Sam leapt a row of broken cobblestones, turned by the rain into a miniature urban brook, and focused his mind on running. He couldn’t do anything about what lay in back of him or what lay ahead. For now, running was his entire being.

The carriage had been somewhere on Fleet Street when it had stopped, but Sam had cut off the busy thoroughfare. He ran parallel to the Thames now, the river out of sight somewhere to his right.

He felt the stretch in the muscles of his legs as he fought for even more speed. He hadn’t run like this—full out, in desperation and hope—since Spinner’s Falls. Then, no matter how he’d strained, he’d still arrived too late. Reynaud had died.

He swerved to avoid a young girl carrying a baby and crashed into a bulky man in a leather apron. The man swore and tried to strike him, but Sam was already past him. His feet hurt, sharp shards of pain working their way up his shins. He wondered if he’d reopened the wounds on his soles.

And then the smell hit him.

Whether it was from the leather-aproned man or someone he passed now, or maybe it was just a product of his fevered imagination, he didn’t know, but he smelled sweat. Male sweat. Oh, God, not now. He kept his eyes open and his legs pumping, though he wanted to cover his face and slump to the ground. The dead of Spinner’s Falls seemed to follow him. Invisible bodies that reeked of sweat and blood. Ghostly hands that caught at his sleeves and implored him to wait. He’d felt these wraiths in the forest after Spinner’s Falls. They’d followed him all the way to Fort Edward. Sometimes he’d even seen them, a boy’s eyes hollowed by fear, the old soldier with his scalp cut away. He’d never known if he’d been dreaming—running while only half awake—or if the dead of Spinner’s Falls had leaked into his living body. Perhaps he carried them everywhere and only knew it when he was in distress. Perhaps he’d always carry them, the way some men carried shrapnel beneath their skin, a silent ache, an invisible reminder of what he’d survived.

He ran through a wash of water, the splashes hitting him in the thighs. Not that it mattered; his clothes had long since soaked through. He was running closer to the wharves now, and he could smell the decay of the river. Tall warehouses rose up on either side of the lane he ran down. His breath came in gasps, and there was a scorching pain in his side. He’d lost track of time, couldn’t tell how long or how far he’d been running. What if they were already at the ship? What if Thornton had already killed them?

His mind suddenly flashed a horrific image: Emeline sprawled, naked and bloody, her face white and still. No! He squeezed his eyes shut against the sight and stumbled, slamming to his hands and knees on the cobblestones.

“Watch it!” a gruff male voice shouted.

Sam opened his eyes to see horse hooves inches from his face. He scrambled clumsily away, still on his knees, as the cart driver cursed his ancestry. His knees ached, especially his right one, which must’ve taken the brunt of the fall, but Sam stood.

Ignoring the driver, ignoring the breath rasping in his lungs, ignoring his pain, he started running again.

Emeline.

THE CARRIAGE MADE a wide turn, and Emeline could see the docks outside the window. The rain was still sheeting down, veiling tall ships out in the middle of the Thames. Smaller vessels crowded between the ships, ferrying goods and sometimes people between ship and shore. Normally, the docks would be full of laborers, prostitutes, and the gangs of thieves that made their livings off filching from the ships’ cargos. But because of the rain, the wharf was sparsely populated.