How to Lose a Bride in One Night (Forgotten Princesses #3)(6)

He scratched at his bristly jaw, unable to recall the last time he had shaved. Perhaps a week ago. He hadn’t cared enough even when he had arrived home into the loving embrace of his family. Not that he had stayed longer than a day. It took him all of five minutes in the company of Jamie and Paget to realize he couldn’t stomach either one of them.

His brother and bride were nauseatingly happy, and he was not fit company for happy people. It had nothing to do with the fact that his older brother had wed his own childhood sweetheart. Discovering Jamie and Paget happily wed had not overly concerned him. Not as it would have four years ago when he was besotted with Paget. When he possessed a heart. When he was more than the shell of a man he was now.

He felt only relief to know that Paget had moved on—that she wasn’t waiting for him. There was no disappointing her. Because what he was, who he had become . . . there was no coming back from that.

The Owen they once knew was dead. Lost halfway around the world.

His mount quickened its pace, and he knew he was approaching the river. Reaching its banks, he dismounted and led the horse to water, holding the reins loosely in his hand as it drank.

He scanned his surroundings, his gaze missing nothing on land or water. He might be in the land of his birth, a mere day’s ride from London, but a part of him would always be back in India scouting for rebels. Ready to kill. A talent he had perfected these past few years. It turned out he was extraordinarily good at killing.

His gaze stopped, arresting on something several yards downriver. Everything inside him tightened with familiar alertness, his time as a soldier rushing to the surface.

Ever wary, he moved closer. At first he thought it nothing more than a mound of fabric, discarded and washed ashore. Even soiled, the material was startling white alongside the muddy bank. But then he detected the shape of a body beneath the sopping wet fabric.

A female body.

She lay facedown, a limp arm stretched above her head. One leg stretched out, the pale foot and calf disappearing into the ink of water. He took a slow look around, well aware that a trap could wait anywhere. She could be the bait some nefarious brigands left to lure unsuspecting travelers to a foul end.

The still and silent woods met his sweeping stare, the gentle slap of water the only sound. He pushed the ghosts from his head, burying the cries of dead men deep as he turned his attention back to the woman. He cautiously approached. Crouching, he carefully touched her shoulder and rolled her onto her back.

She was young. Her face ashen. Eyes closed, her lashes fanned out against her cheeks in dark crescents that looked almost obscene against her waxy, colorless skin.

He pressed his fingertips to her throat. Icy cold to the touch, her pulse hiccupped, the smallest, barely-there flutter. Soft as a moth’s wings. Not good.

He leaned closer, listening for her breath. The air escaped her bloodless lips in tiny, hard-fought rasps. He compressed his lips.

His gaze skimmed her, assessing. Scratches, cuts, and bruises marred her pale skin. The hem of her gown was streaked in faint pink tinges of blood. He tugged the gown up, checking for injuries, wincing at the sight of her leg. From the odd shape, it was clearly broken. A deep gash on her foot probably needed stitching as well. Owen glanced to the river and back at her, marveling that she was alive. Given her injuries, he couldn’t quite fathom how she had not drowned.

Staring at her for a long moment, he brushed some of the brown hair from her forehead. “How’d you get in that river, hmm?”

His mind quickly worked, plotting the best way to find her help. He had spent the last five years attacking sepoys, assassinating them at the behest of his commanders. He was about taking lives, not saving.

They were a day’s ride from his family home—not that he wanted to return there again. The next village was a half day ride south. He’d planned on spending the night there before continuing on to London.

Sighing, he glanced around them again, suddenly wishing someone else would happen upon them. Someone better equipped to care for a female who didn’t look as though she would live out the day.

“Come, little one,” he murmured, slipping his arms beneath her, one beneath her legs and the other at her back, taking care not to jostle her leg more than necessary.

Contrary to his words, she was no fragile bit of crystal. She was generously curved in his arms, and yet his six-foot-plus frame ate up the distance toward his horse as if she weighed nothing at all. After grueling conditions in India, she was only a slight burden.

Remounting with her in his arms was a tricky task, but he managed it, laying her carefully across his lap. With her legs dangled off to one side, he grasped the reins and prodded his mount to move. Her head lolled against his chest, her face settling against his well-worn jacket. Almost trustingly, it seemed. Absurd, of course. She was unconscious.

Disconcerted, he blinked down at her. It was impossible to recall the last time a woman had fallen asleep in his arms. There’d been women in his life, in his bed, but no one that he actually slept with. No one he had held in his arms once he satisfied his body’s need for them.

Looking up again, he urged his mount into a faster clip, eager to reach the next town and rid himself of this newfound burden. So that he could be on his way. Just him and the demons of his past.

The female in his arms stiffened with a sharp gasp.

Startled, he looked down to find himself staring into a pair of brown eyes. Framed in lush lashes, the eyes were no ordinary brown. They were velvety . . . brown rimmed in the darkest black. They shined, as if lit from within. She stared directly at him, the fear there unmistakable.