Page 14 of The Winter Husband
By the time she descended a half hour later, he’d paced a furrow in the hallway. She wore a plain dun-colored dress with several shawls wrapped around her shoulders. Less for warmth, he figured, than armor for her virtue.
“Ready?” he asked.
She nodded and lifted the satchel in her hand. Her jaw was fixed, her face stoic. He hoped her courage lasted.
They left the lodgings and headed toward the lower town. He focused on the sky, on the shadows on the heavy underside of the clouds, and the melt of a light snow on his face. He mentally willed the deep winter to hold up for just a day more. He could paddle his way to the cabin by nightfall, if he put his back into it, even if a heavy snow arrived as early as the afternoon. It was easier to worry about the weather than what the hell he was going to do with Marie once they were snowbound in his cabin together.
As they approached the descent to the lower town, two figures separated from the shadows of a tavern. With a bolt of recognition, Lucas stopped short.
“Captain Girard.” Hugo Landry stepped into his path, velvet skirts swinging. “Congratulations are in order, so I see.”
Lucas’s soldier’s sense prickled. The stench of trouble billowed off these cousins, along with the fumes of rum. “Awake so early? Or did you not bother to sleep?”
Landry’s gaze slid to Marie. “None of us got much sleep last night.”
Lucas mentally cracked his knuckles against Landry’s ruddy cheek, but the pressure of Marie’s fingers around his elbow gave him pause. How hard would he have to push her out of the way before fists flew?
“I saw you leave your lodgings without your pretty wife quite early this morning.” Landry tapped his ivory-topped walking stick against the frozen path. “You headed straight to Talon’s office. Am I to assume the papers are signed, then?
So that was what this was about—the land grant. Damn it, Talon never should have gotten these men involved. For all the velvet and spice pomade, Landry was at heart a badger—sneaky, strong, and clever. Fortin, his cousin, was the killer of the two. They wouldn’t let the matter go.
He said, “You should have heeded my warnings, Landry.”
“I’ve never been a man to take heed.”
“Talon brought you into the deal only to convince me to commit to his terms. It worked. The land is mine.”
And the woman.
“I wouldn’t be so hasty, Captain. You thought you got the better of me once before, when you marched us to that atrocious Montreal jail.” He spread his hands. “And yet here I am, as free as any Frenchman.”
Lucas flexed his fingers over the strap of his satchel, ready to drop the burden at Landry’s first move.
“Indulge my curiosity, won’t you?” Landry’s gaze slid to Marie. “Does our lovely Chepewéssin really blow cold?”
A red haze coated Lucas’s vision. Landry was baiting him to strike the first blow. His better sense warned him not to attack two ruthless men while a vulnerable woman hung on his arm, while the street was empty, and no witnesses were here to police the fray. Then he remembered the knife in Marie’s garter and wondered how well she could use it—
“Lucas! Marie.”
Philippe’s shout came from behind him. Lucas didn’t take his eyes off the men, or the smirks dimming on their faces, even when Philippe raced up to slap a friendly hand on his shoulder.
“I’m glad I caught you before you pushed off. Etta made dinner for your journey.” Philippe raised a cloth-wrapped package before shifting his attention to the cousins. “Good morning to you, gentlemen. Have you come to see the newlyweds off?”
Philippe’s free-of-care tone barely concealed a warning. The milky-eyed Fortin must have heard it, or just didn’t like the new odds, for he slid his fingers away from whatever weapon he’d been reaching for beneath his coat.
“I see you have powerful friends also, Captain.” Landry tilted his head in the barest of nods. “Well played.”
“Yes, well, let’s delay no more.” Philippe patted Lucas’s shoulder again. “You’ve got a long way to paddle. I’m on the way to the lower town. Shall we join our paths?”
Philippe barreled forward. Lucas pressed his elbow to his side to keep Marie safe as they followed.
“In broad daylight,” Philippe muttered once Lucas fell into pace beside him. “I didn’t think they’d be so bold—or stupid.”
Lucas caught Philippe’s eye, then tilted his head toward Marie. She had wrapped an ebony-black shawl over her head, which only made stark the deathly white of her face.
“Don’t,” she said, catching the shared look. “I’m not a child. I saw that one-eyed man grip his knife. We were lucky you arrived, Philippe.”
Philippe shrugged. “On the contrary,theywere lucky. I’ve seen your husband fight. He’d have gutted them both.”
