“The bitch is coming to us!” Finn roared to his men. Sparks from the outdoor fire shot into the air almost as if conjured up by him and his words. With a bottle of wine in one hand and a fist in the other, Finn had gathered his crew of twenty men. “And we’ll meet her halfway. Are we not accommodating?” His gang laughed, more from a general belief that it was expected of them rather than any real mirth. “I don’t want her touched so be mindful of that,” he said. “Anyone else—and she will not come alone—kill them straightaway. D’ya ken?”
He turned and clapped young Conor on the shoulder and handed him the wine bottle. Before he turned to go back into the house where he would drink alone until he fell asleep, his glance fell briefly on David.
The plan was easy if not foolproof.
David ate the moldy soda bread and washed it down with strong, tepid tea. He felt lucky there was anything to eat this morning at all. Like the others, Brendan had drunk too much and was still asleep. One of the younger gypsy boys, with terrible acne and crossed eyes, had made him breakfast, such as it was. The cold had been awful during the night and David fought to return feeling to his numb fingers and toes. He slept by the campfire which usually went out a few hours after he nodded off. He wasn’t tied or restrained in any way as he was still considered too weak to do much more than bring a spoon back and forth to his lips.
He may have encouraged that assumption more than was absolutely accurate.
David could tell that most of the gypsies were still sleeping off last night’s drinking. Even Finn, usually an early riser, hadn’t shown himself yet this morning.
All David had to do was get up as if he were going to relieve himself in the woods, like he had done many times before, and just keep walking. With any luck at all, he’d intercept Sarah and her group well before they were ambushed by Finn’s death squad.
He took one more look around the deserted camp, stood up, brushed the nonexistent crumbs from his meager breakfast off his jeans, and headed for the woods.
Sarah sat quietly atop Dan. The bad weather was definitely moving in and quickly. She looked around at the small group of men, also on horseback, and felt a wave of discouragement.
Couldn’t the storm have held off just one day?
Four men sat their horses and alternately watched her and the skies. One—a big fellow named Bill—would stay behind to protect the women and children.
It wasn’t early. Sarah hadn’t been sure if that mattered and Donovan didn’t seem to have an opinion on it.
“D’ya think I have experience in this sort of thing?” he had responded sourly when she queried him.
No one had experience in any of the things they were lately being called upon to do, Sarah thought, least of all her.
She glanced back at the black hulk that was once their cottage. Just thinking about Dierdre and the loss of her was enough to make Sarah want to slide out of her saddle and return to her cold bedroll in the barn. The feisty little Irishwoman had been Sarah’s emotional mainstay since the crisis had happened. Whether it had been leek and kidney pies or tips on carding wool or common sense advice on how to keep her worries about John’s safety at bay, Sarah didn’t feel she’d ever find a dearer or more valuable friend.
While the men checked and rechecked their tack and guns and studied the weather, Sarah closed her eyes and prayed.
The further he got from the camp, the harder David ran, unmindful of the noise he was making as he crashed through the dense woods. From what he’d heard last night around the campfire, he was fairly certain he knew the direction that Sarah’s party was coming. If they were on horseback as was generally assumed, they’d have to come down either the main road or across the pastures. Because he didn’t know the area or the trails, David ran parallel to the main road and away from the gypsy camp.
His arm, mended but not strong, hung at an unnatural angle to his body as he ran.
His mind raced.
Would he be able to hear Sarah’s group on the road? Would he be able to identify them? It didn’t make sense that Sarah would actually be with them but Finn seemed convinced she would be. Would they shoot first when he hailed them?
Would this nightmare ever be over?
David stumbled against a root and caught himself from plowing face first into the ground. His breathing was coming in short, ragged gasps but he was afraid to stop and rest. He needed to get distance from himself and the camp. Even that drunken, lazy crowd had probably noticed his absence by now.
He forced a long breath into his lungs and, exhaling, pushed himself off a small sapling for momentum.
“Whoa, sport. Where would ye be heading now?”
The words were as friendly as the tone was deadly.
David froze.
Brendan came through the bushes ahead of David, a smile on his face that never reached his eyes.
“Making a run for it, Yank?”
“And so, I want to thank each of you,” Sarah said, wiping the perspiration from the palms of her hands on her jeans and gripping the reins tightly. “I know that you know we can’t live with this group of… of cowards and murderers virtually in our midst and that without any police to protect us, we need to step forward and deal with it.”
The men listened passively and for a moment Sarah found herself wondering if they only spoke Gaelic although she knew that wasn’t true. Out of the corner of her eye she saw one of the wives standing by the cook fire in jeans and running shoes. The woman stood with her hands on her hips staring directly at Sarah. It was not a friendly stare.
Why were they doing this? She looked at Donovan who was still watching the storm clouds move in. Were they really risking their lives just because Donovan asked them to?
The night before she told herself she didn’t care why the men came with her, as long as they did. She would worry about morals and why and all that once she had David back with her. In fact, now that she thought about it, she realized that once David was back, she wouldn’t need to think about it. Unless…she looked at the glowering wife again. Unless some of them didn’t come back. Was she asking this woman to risk her husband so that Sarah could retrieve her own? Was this just another case of the rich American’s needs and wants trumping everyone else’s?
Why were these thoughts invading her head now of all times?
In exasperation, Sarah jerked Dan’s head away from the center of the camp and pushed him forward with her legs.
I can’t think about any of this right now, she thought. Let’s just do this.
From what Donovan had told her, she figured it was at least a thirty-minute ride to where the gypsies were camped out at an abandoned neighboring farm. Sarah didn’t want to lose the one advantage they had—the surprise factor—and so she’d suggested to Donovan that they not ride in a group but in spaced-out single file. He seemed fine with the suggestion.
She was grateful for the man. He was a natural leader and the men in the camp, even the older ones, clearly all looked to him to tell them what to do in this new and uncertain world after the crisis.