“Yes.” He looked at her as if she were an idiot. “He hurt you. And if I have to choose between you or him, it’s simple. I choose you.”
The words hung in the air between them like a dark promise, a vow. He sent her an immeasurable look; both savage and beautiful at once. Heloise’s stomach lurched. He was a terrifying sight, his fists red with blood, his lip split, his hair dirty and disheveled. Her heart gave an uncomfortable jolt as he strode toward her, stopping a foot away.
His eyes narrowed. “For God’s sake, cover yourself.”
She glanced down and realized that the front of her bodice had been torn. Her left breast was almost completely exposed to his view. She clutched the sagging cloth to her chest as a hot wave of shame and outrage scorched her skin. He raised his hand and she flinched. A bitter smile twisted his lips at her unguarded reaction. He reached out again, slower this time, his expression silently challenging her to stay still. He steadied her jaw and brushed the pad of his thumb over her lips, the silent gentleness at odds with the fierce expression on his face.
Her lower lip tingled as he rolled it down and brushed the slick inner lining. The tension that had started inside the cave sprang to life again. Total prickling awareness. It arced and fizzled in the air, so tangible she half expected to see it.
Her breath caught in her throat. A bright red smear of blood streaked his thumb. She watched, spellbound, as he brought it up and licked it clean, exactly as he had done with the rose-flavored sweet. She stilled, both repulsed and inexplicably aroused by such a primitive gesture. Her blood in his mouth. She felt faint.
“Are you afraid now, Hellcat?” He leaned in, and his huge shoulders blocked out the sun. “Because you should be.”
She swallowed painfully and nodded.
“Good.”
Chapter 25
The moment was broken by a rustle from the bushes. Heloise braced for another attack, but Sergeant Mullaney staggered into the clearing, almost bent double.
“Bastards jumped me from behind,” he groaned, sinking down on a rock and trying to staunch a wound at the back of his head. He pulled his hand away and scowled at the red smear.
A pitiful groan diverted their attention.
“Sergeant Canning!” Heloise rushed to the boy’s side and turned him gently onto his back. His right eye was a mess, swollen shut and turning black, but he was alive. Heloise breathed a silent prayer of thanks.
He struggled to speak. “I’m so sorry, my lady. I—”
Heloise stroked his forehead. “Shh, it’s all right. Don’t try to talk.”
He tried to sit up, the stubborn child. She rubbed his back as he linked his arms around his bent knees and dropped his head onto them in an attitude of pain and exhaustion.
Raven strode off into the scrub and returned leading Hades. He stopped in front of Canning.
“Let’s get you back to camp. You’ll ride with me.”
Canning cried out as Raven helped him to his feet, but made no complaint when Raven swung up behind him on the horse. His face was as pale as a ghost. Heloise winced in sympathy. From the odd angle of his left arm it was clear he’d broken a bone.
She helped Mullaney bind the gash on his head with his sash, untied Persephone, and followed behind without a word. Canning passed out before they even made it halfway down the hill, which was probably a mercy. Raven was ominously silent.
The setting sun pained the landscape with a glorious palette of colors, as if mocking her dark thoughts with its beauty. A wave of guilt washed over her. Canning’s injury was all her fault. He could have been killed. If she hadn’t insisted on ignoring Raven’s advice…
The silence began to wear on her nerves. Her teeth began to chatter and she wished Raven would just shout and rail at her for her stupidity. She deserved it. But no, this was worse, this silent, brooding disapproval.
Their arrival at the palace elicited cries of alarm, but Raven brushed them all aside. Directed by a visibly shaken Scovell he carried Canning to his barracks room, sent someone for a doctor, then strode off without a glance at Heloise. He remounted Hades and started toward the doorway.
“Where are you going?” she called out after him, hating the catch of panic in her voice.
“Wherever I damn well please,” he growled.
—
Raven headed out of the city. Bloody woman. She probably thought he was going back to finish off that last attacker. He wasn’t. Not that he wasn’t aching to kill the bastard, slowly and painfully. The whoreson had threatened her. He’d make it last a full week. The ones he’d killed straightaway had been let off too lightly. Swift deaths had been far too merciful. But no, he’d told her he wouldn’t, hadn’t he?
When he reached a stream he stripped off his clothes and waded in. He washed the blood from his swollen knuckles, then ducked under the water and washed his hair.
The frigid water was a relief. It cooled some of his anger and cleared his head. He closed his eyes as the appalling truth crystallized. He’d killed four men. Right in front of her.