Claiming the Forbidden Bride

Chapter Three

‘Wake up, chavi.’

At the childhood term of endearment her grandmother still used for her, Nadya opened her eyes to find the old woman bending over the bed. Her first thought was that something had happened to her patient.

‘Is his fever up?’

‘No, no. That one’s fine.’

‘Then why aren’t you with the gaujo? You promised you’d watch him.’

‘Angel is watching him.’

‘Angel?’ Nadya struggled to clear the cobwebs from her brain as she sat up. She had no idea how long she’d been asleep. All she knew with any certainty was that it hadn’t been nearly long enough. ‘I don’t understand.’

‘Stephano’s back. I thought you would want to know.’

Although he was the Rom Baro, titular head of their kumpania, her half-brother had spent most of this year away from camp. And since Nadya had no doubt what his feelings would be about the Englishman she was caring for, to have Stephano unexpectedly show up now, with her patient on the verge of recovery, seemed the height of irony.

‘Have you told him about the gaujo?’

Nadya knew that if Magda hadn’t, she soon would. The old woman shared a bond with her grandson stronger even than that between the two of them.

‘He’s just arrived. I came to let you know while the others are welcoming him home.’

‘Someone’s bound to tell him.’

‘Of course they will, chavi. It’s his right to be told what has gone on here in his absence.’

‘That should take a while,’ Nadya said bitterly.

She flung her covers off and then ran her fingers through her hair as she tried to think. Her reasons for succouring her daughter’s rescuer were valid, but Stephano harboured a deep-seated hatred of all gadje, especially those belonging to the same social class as his English father.

To Nadya, that made the fact that Stephano chose to live among them rather than with his mother’s people more incomprehensible. Of course, her half-brother had been reared as a privileged member of that world for most of his childhood. In her opinion, the bitterness he felt for the gadje had far more to do with the interruption of that idyllic existence than did his Romany blood.

‘What are you going to do?’ Magda asked as Nadya threw her shawl around her shoulders.

‘See to my patient, who has apparently been left in the charge of a four-year-old.’

Nadya had hoped to return to her own caravan before her half-brother came looking for her, but as she descended the high steps of her grandmother’s vardo, she saw Stephano coming across the compound. His long stride checked when he spotted her.

‘We need to talk,’ he called.

‘Later. I have something important to see to.’ Pretending to believe that would satisfy him, she wrapped her shawl more tightly around her shoulders and continued on her path.

She had no doubt Stephano would follow, but at least this way their confrontation wouldn’t be witnessed by the entire camp. As she hurried toward her wagon, head lowered against the bite of the evening wind, she almost ran into her daughter.

Angel grabbed a handful of her skirt, tugging at it imperiously. With one finger she pointed in the direction of the caravan they shared. Then, looking back up to make sure she had her mother’s attention, the little girl closed her eyes very tightly and before opening them wide again.

Apparently the Englishman was awake. Just in time to be introduced to her arrogant half-brother, Nadya thought resignedly.

A hand on her shoulder, as demanding as her daughter’s had been on her skirts, turned her. The sight of Stephano’s furious face drove any other consideration from her mind. Clearly, it hadn’t taken as long as she’d hoped for someone to share with him all that had happened while he was away.

Stephano opened his mouth, but Angel’s headlong rush toward him postponed whatever invective he’d been prepared to spew. His dark eyes flashed a warning to Nadya that this wasn’t the end of it before he bent to pick the little girl up and toss her high into the air. When he caught her, Angel wrapped both arms around his neck, hugging her uncle with delight.

‘Someone’s glad to see me.’ He looked pointedly at Nadya over her daughter’s shoulder.

‘I’m glad to see you. Actually, it’s been so long since you’ve graced us with your presence, I’d almost forgotten what you look like.’

‘Or perhaps you were too busy with other, more pressing concerns to think about me,’ he suggested with a mocking smile.

‘We all must be busy with something, I suppose.’

After her lightly veiled reference to Stephano’s mysterious affairs, she turned to continue walking toward her caravan, knowing he would follow. And every step he took lessened the odds that the others would overhear his tirade.

Of course, their grandmother had been correct. Stephano had every right to question her actions. Or those of any member of the kumpania.

Thus far, however, none of the others had seemed to find anything strange about what she’d been doing. And until the Englishman was well enough to leave, she had wished for nothing more devoutly than to keep it that way.

‘Why in God’s name would you do this?’

That demanding voice dragged Rhys reluctantly from sleep. He opened his eyes, instinctively searching for whoever had asked that question. Although it seemed he was now able to turn his head without setting off a cataclysm of pain, he couldn’t locate the speaker.

‘Because he saved Angel’s life,’ a woman said. ‘What would you have done?’

The answering shout of laughter was harsh. Full of derision. And clearly male.

Two voices. The feminine one low, almost musical. The other, the derisive one, was different somehow. A difference not only in tone and volume.

Rhys tried to piece together the clues that had led him to that conclusion. Only when he realized the argument he was eavesdropping on concerned him, did he give up that frustrating process.

‘What would I have done? I should have wondered briefly at his motives,’ the masculine voice mocked, ‘and then forgotten him.’

‘I don’t believe even you are that cynical.’

‘Cynical enough to know that no gadje means us well.’

‘He saved my daughter’s life.’

‘Angel isn’t your daughter.’

‘In every way that matters. Don’t judge me by their standards.’

The masculine laughter this time was softer. No longer derisive. ‘You’re right. You aren’t one of them. But he is. The sooner he’s gone, the better for all of us.’

‘What if I tell you he’s my guest?’ In their culture guests were treated with great courtesy, given the finest food and drink, even if that might be a hardship for the host.

‘I’d say that he’s been your guest long enough. I want him away from here.’

‘He isn’t well enough—’

‘Then let his own care for him. Get rid of him, Nadya. I mean it.’

‘Yes, my lord. Of course, my lord.’ The feminine voice had now adopted the ripe sarcasm of the other. Her assumed humility dripped with it. ‘What else can I, a poor Gypsy girl, do to please his lordship?’

‘Stop it.’ Anger this time, rather than mockery.

‘I don’t tell you what you should do, Stephano. Youdo what you feel you must. I understand that. So remember, please, that I’m not yours to command.’

‘Get rid of him.’ The man’s voice was deadly quiet. Whatever raillery had been between the two had faded into animosity.’ Or had you rather I arrange that myself before I leave?’ he asked silkily.

‘If you do,’ the woman said, ‘you’ll be sorry.’

‘Is that a threat, jel’enedra?’

‘I don’t make threats. You of all people should know that.’

The silence that followed lasted long enough that Rhys had time to wonder if the quarrelling pair had moved out of earshot.

‘Get rid of him, Nadya,’ the man said.’ Or I’ll do it when I return. I don’t want that gaujo here. And I still have the authority here to see to it that what I want happens. You of all people should know that!

A slight movement of the surface on which Rhys rested awakened him. Somewhere a door creaked open—a sound he knew he’d heard before. No light came into the room, but a whiff of wood smoke drifted inside before it closed.

Rhys’s eyes strained against the darkness, trying to get a glimpse of the person who’d entered. The sound of a flint being struck across the room preceded the faint glow of a candle.

He lay perfectly still, waiting for the person who’d lit it to move into his field of vision. As the light came closer, his heart rate increased slightly, driven by curiosity about the owner of the feminine voice he’d heard outside.

Her back to the bed, the woman set the candlestick down on the table where it had rested earlier. Curling black hair, held back by a kerchief, cascaded down her spine. The shawl around her shoulders was intricately patterned, its rich colours glowing faintly in the candlelight.

Finally she turned, reaching out to touch his forehead. Her hand hesitated in mid-air when she realized his eyes were open. As the long seconds ticked by, silently they regarded one another.

The mocking phrase ‘poor Gypsy girl’ had prepared Rhys for much of what he now saw. Nothing, however, could have prepared him for the effect of the rest.

A few dusky curls escaped the restraining kerchief to cluster around the perfect oval of her face. Her skin, like the colours of the shawl, was almost luminous in the candle’s glow. Only the almond-shaped eyes, as black as her hair, hinted at the ethnic claim she had made during the argument he’d overheard.

Finally she swallowed, the candlelight tracing the movement down the slender column of her throat. ‘You’re awake.’

‘I don’t know. I think so.’

His meaning was ambiguous, even to him, but the corners of her lips curved upward. Coal-black lashes quickly fell to hide the laughter in her eyes, which she controlled before she looked up at him again.

‘Good.’ The hand she had begun to extend completed its journey, resting cool and light against his brow.

Something peculiar happened to Rhys’s breathing. The normal functioning of his heart and lungs seemed to hesitate for the first time in the thirty-two years of his existence. After a moment, the Gypsy removed her hand, allowing both to resume their normal rhythm.

‘No fever.’ Her pronouncement held a trace of satisfaction, as if she were somehow responsible for that.

He nodded agreement, and then realized he still had no idea why he was here—or even where here was. A dozen questions formed in his brain, but she turned away from the bed before his befuddled mind could frame them.

When she came back, the slim fingers he’d remembered held the medicine cup again. As she had before, she slipped her hand under the back of his head, lifting it enough to allow him to sip the liquid it contained.

The taste was bitter, almost numbing his tongue with its astringency. At least this time that, rather than the agony in his head, was his primary sensation. Relieved, he swallowed the remainder of the potion, realizing only after the fact that she might have been giving him anything.

‘Water?’ he requested hoarsely.

‘Of course.’

Again she moved out of his line of sight, giving him a brief respite from emotions that had been running rampant since the moment she’d appeared in front of him. Too long without a woman, his friends would have jeered. Time to think about settling down, his brother would have advised. Smitten, Abigail would have proclaimed smugly, just as she had when he’d obediently fetched punch at a country dance for the prospective bride she’d chosen for him.

Perhaps all of those things were true. Or perhaps his brain was merely addled by the pain in his head or by another attack of fever. Still, whatever had happened in the last few moments had been quite beyond his experience.

Smitten. He had never been completely sure what that term meant. Other than that someone was about to become an object of ridicule to his fellows.

The strange thing was he didn’t feel ridiculous at all. What he felt was as alien as his surroundings. Territory as unexplored as any he’d encountered during the long years he’d spent in Iberia.

‘Here.’

He lifted his eyes to find the girl leaning over his bed again. Once more she slipped her hand beneath his head, raising it as she placed a horn cup against his lips. He swallowed gratefully, the coolness of the water relieving the seemingly constant dryness of his throat.

As he drank, he was aware of her closeness. A strand of midnight hair had fallen over her shoulder to rest against his pillow. It smelled of sunshine.

She lowered the rim of the cup when he’d finished all it contained.’ Enough?’

He nodded. ‘Thank you.’

‘How are you feeling?’

‘Disoriented, ‘he answered truthfully. ‘Where are we?’

There was a moment’s hesitation. ‘You’re in my home. Which at the moment happens to be in the middle of Harpsden Wood.’

‘At the moment?’

‘I fear you’ve fallen among the Rom, my lord. My home is on wheels.’

Fallen among the Rom…

Which made it sound as if he’d come here through some misadventure. Try as he might, he couldn’t remember what that could have been.

‘Had I been overcome by fever?’

‘And a blow to the head.’ With her thumb she touched a place on his temple, causing him to flinch.

The movement was too sudden, setting off the now-familiar peal of anvils against his skull. He closed his eyes, knowing that all he could do was endure until the pain and the nausea had faded.

‘I’m sorry. I should have known better. I can give you something for the pain.’

She began to turn, but before she could complete the motion, his fingers fastened around her wrist. ‘No.’

He’d had experience with the drugs the doctors gave to deaden pain. And far more memorable experiences with learning to do without them. He could better endure the ache in his head than endure that again.

Her eyes had widened at his command, but she didn’t argue. Nor did she pull her arm away.

‘As you wish,’ she said simply and then waited.

After a moment Rhys found the presence of mind to release her. Even after she’d gone, however, taking the candle with her, it seemed he could still feel beneath his fingertips the cool, smooth skin that covered the slender wrist he’d grasped.

And despite his exhaustion and the Gypsy’s potions, it was a long time before he could sleep.

Nadya blew out the candle she carried and set it down on the floor beside the bed in her grandmother’s caravan. Angeline was already asleep there, snuggled under the covers like a tired puppy.

Nadya lifted the piled quilts and slipped under them. She pulled the little girl to her, relishing the warmth of her body. Her chin settled atop the child’s head, but she didn’t close her eyes for a long time. Instead, she stared into the darkness, thinking about the Englishman.

Stephano’s ultimatum didn’t worry her. After all, he would be away for the next few days—as he had been for most of the spring and summer. Although her half-brother certainly had the authority he’d bragged about tonight, his own concerns had kept him from exercising the kind of control on the kumpania’s activities that her father had enforced. Besides, given the fact the gaujo was coherent tonight, his recovery would, in her experience, occur very quickly now.

It wasn’t the possibility that she couldn’t get him out of the encampment fast enough to suit Stephano that kept her awake, staring into the darkness long after her daughter had fallen back into the innocent sleep of childhood. It was rather, she finally conceded, the probability that he would be gone long before her halfbrother returned to see if his orders had been obeyed.

Why should she care if the gaujo she’d never laid eyes on until a week ago disappeared from her life? England was full of gadje. And most of the ones Nadya had met were more than eager to further their acquaintance with her.

So what could it possibly matter if she never saw this one again? she asked herself with a small shrug of disdain. Feeling that motion, Angeline turned, settling more closely against her. As she returned the little girl’s embrace, Nadya reiterated the mantra she’d only tonight found necessary to formulate.

She had everything she needed. A child she loved. Respect in her community. More than enough money to meet her needs and the capacity for earning more.

Everything, she told herself again, she could possibly want.

Even as the thought formed, she knew it for the lie it was. She had the same physical needs of every otherwoman. And, though the capability to assuage her needs was always at hand, both here in camp and elsewhere, she had so far chosen not to avail herself of those opportunities.

More fool you. If you have an itch for a man, there are far better choices than a gadje lord.

That sort of liaison had never meant anything but dishonour and heartbreak for her kind.

She knew that. Had long ago acknowledged it. Yet tonight.

Tonight, when she had leaned down to put the cup to the Englishman’s lips, she had instead wanted to fasten her own over them. To taste his kiss. To know, however briefly, what it would feel like to be held in his arms.

And for the first time in her very pragmatic existence, Nadya Argentari couldn’t rationalize away the strength of that very emotional response. Or deny its reality.

She was still trying when she fell asleep.

Chapter Four

Rhys opened his eyes to sunlight. The first thing he realized was that it didn’t hurt his head. The second was that it allowed him to get a much better look at his surroundings than he had been able to before.

He knew, because the Gypsy girl had told him, that he was in her caravan. Her home on wheels.

This morning, a section of wall in the part where he lay had been propped open to allow both light and fresh air inside. The slightly medicinal scent he’d been aware of last night had been replaced by the crispness of the English countryside in autumn.

He drew a deep, savouring breath of it into his lungs. As he did, he identified other smells, familiar from his campaigning days. Wood smoke. Fresh meat turning on a spit somewhere.

The sounds were the same as well, he realized. A low hum of conversation. The occasional masculine laugh.

A movement at the periphery of his vision caused him to turn his head. The little girl he’d seen yesterday was again standing at his bedside.

This time her lips immediately curved into a smile, which he couldn’t have resisted responding to, even if he’d been so inclined. She raised her hand and, holding it directly in front of his face, moved two of her fingers up and down.

Puzzled, he shook his head, attempting to soften the denial with another smile. She repeated the motion, cocking her head to the side when she was through, as if waiting for his response.

Again Rhys shook his head, relieved that the movement, which yesterday would have produced blinding pain, didn’t bother him at all this morning. ‘I don’t understand,’ he confessed.

Once more the child made the gesture, clearly frustrated with his lack of understanding.

‘I’m sorry, little one.’ he began.

Apparently, she’d had enough. She turned, disappearing from his field of vision.

Alone again, Rhys raised his eyes to the opening at the end of the caravan. The beech leaves were molten gold in the morning sun. As they swayed in the wind, they cast dappled patterns of light and shade onto the walls of the caravan, reminding him of the countryside he’d ridden through after he’d left Buxton. And, he realized, that was the last thing he did remember.

I fear you’ve fallen among the Rom, the woman had told him. But she’d given him no explanation of how that had occurred. Or of how he’d been injured.

No matter how hard he tried, searching his memory for answers, he could remember almost nothing after he left the inn. All he knew was that he’d been thoroughly enjoying his first taste of freedom since he’d returned to England.

It was possible he’d been attacked by robbers. If so, he had no memory of it. Still, being set upon by highwaymen would explain the blow to the head, so that version of events seemed logical. Whether the Gypsies had been his attackers or his rescuers, however—

‘Angel said you were awake. How do you feel?’

The woman who’d given him the medicine last night was back. Today the kerchief had been replaced by two gold combs, which glittered among her midnight curls as if bejewelled.

The shawl that had covered her shoulders had also disappeared. The cap-sleeved blouse she wore would offer little protection against the morning’s chill, but the white fabric flattered the smooth tan of her shoulders.

Despite its décolleté, something he was suddenly extremely aware of, the garment was no more revealing than the gowns he’d seen at the country party his sister-in-law had dragged him to. Merely the fashion, he told himself. Still, he hadn’t reacted to those rounded white shoulders in quite the same way his body was responding to these.

‘Angel?’ The question was a form of self-defence, since he was certain of the source of her information.

‘Her name’s Angeline, but… ‘The woman shrugged, the movement again drawing his eyes to the beginning curve of her breasts, visible above the low neckline.

Rhys raised his eyes, smiling into hers. ‘I’m afraid she wasn’t very pleased with me.’

‘Really? She seemed excited you’re awake.’

‘She kept doing something with her fingers. I think she expected me to be able to figure out what it was, but.’ He shook his head.

‘Can you show me?’

Feeling foolish for having brought it up, Rhys repeated the gesture the child had made.

The woman laughed. ‘She wanted you to come with her. And since she is, I’m afraid, too accustomed to having her own way, I’m sure she thought you wouldn’t hesitate to oblige.’

‘I should have tried. If she’d told me what she wanted.’

‘Angel doesn’t speak. Nor does she hear what we say.’

‘She’s deaf,’ Rhys spoke the sudden realization aloud, and then wondered at his own stupidity in not understanding the situation sooner. ‘Forgive me. You must think me very slow.’

‘I think you’ve had a severe blow to the head. It’s to be expected that things seem strange. As all of thiscertainly must.’ One slender hand gestured at their surroundings.