Chapter 9 #2
“I’d greet you properly, Daniel,” Ezra said around Molly the dog’s excited attentions, “but I’m sorry to report your fierce guard dog has me pinned. I mightn’t survive the encounter.”
Daniel snapped his fingers. He had to do it twice more before Molly backed away from Ezra, permitting him to rise and shake hands with the farmer.
The other man glanced at Jessica. She offered him a respectful nod, then sent as friendly a smile as she could toward his wife, who came forward.
The woman continued to hold the babe, while the smaller child shyly slipped his hand into the older girl’s.
This close, the lines around the woman’s mouth became more visible, and her freckles stood out in pale gold flecks against her fair skin.
She offered a cautious smile in return, but it grew when she turned to Tej, Rhys, and Ezra.
“As fair a flower as ever, Iris.” Tej stepped to her and took her free hand, which he pressed to his lips.
Iris flushed but didn’t snatch her hand away.
“I never know whether to welcome your visits,” Daniel said, as he wryly watched this scene, “or chase you off.”
He brandished his axe, yet there was humor in his eyes.
“No rudeness to Mr. Mehta,” Iris admonished. “Nor to Mr. Brody or Mr. Davis.”
It was only then that Jessica realized she hadn’t learned Tej and Rhys’s surnames until now. Strange, that, especially after they had both witnessed her fuck Ezra, and frigged themselves as they’d watched.
Jessica shook her loose hair into her face. Hopefully it would curtain her cheeks so no one could see them turn red.
“There are oatcakes,” Iris said, “and a bit of tea left. I’m afraid you’ll find our hospitality lacking at the moment.”
“No one can fault your hospitality,” Ezra replied firmly. “And we’ve eaten amply, so there’s no need to concern yourself with filling our bellies.”
Their simple meal in the forest had been hours ago, and not especially satisfying, but that was something Iris and Daniel didn’t need to know.
“The soggy spring has made for a poor harvest,” Daniel said with a grimace. “Never enough sun to dry the crops out properly.”
“Try telling that to Mr. Frears.” Iris scowled. “He’ll have our full rent regardless of what we can harvest. We say to him, tell your master that the earth will only yield what it yields, but that matters little to him or the lord he serves.”
“His daughter must have her London season.” Bitterness corroded Daniel’s words. “Never mind that my daughter owns not a single pair of shoes.”
The girl in question, who still held her brother’s hand, pinkened. Yet she didn’t say anything.
“Perhaps this will ensure Jeannie has something to protect her tender little feet.” Ezra pulled several gold coins from the pouch at his waist and held them out to Daniel.
The farmer’s eyes widened, but he kept his hand at his side. His wife did the same, eyeing the money yet clutching the babe tighter to her, rather than take what Ezra offered.
The tiny child stirred fitfully in his mother’s arms before subsiding. His eyes were glassy.
“That’s too much,” Daniel murmured.
“It’s enough to cover a year’s rent,” Rhys said evenly. “And keep you in shoes.”
“And ensure you have more to eat than just oatcakes,” Tej added.
Still, Daniel didn’t move.
“You don’t know me,” Jessica said into the silence, “but you’d be doing me a great favor if you accepted what Mr. Brody is happily giving you.”
“A favor, madam?” Iris looked doubtful.
“The aristocrat who provided the funds,” Jessica explained, “isn’t a good man. In fact, he’s atrocious. He’d be extremely unhappy to know that his ill-gotten wealth was given to people who deserve it.”
“How is that a favor to you, madam?” Daniel asked.
“Like it or not, I helped in a small way to keep men like him in power. Seeing your family given a bit of comfort and security at his expense gives balance to the world. Not fully, but it provides me a sliver of ease. Please,” she added, when both Daniel and Iris continued to hold back, “take the money.”
“Well…” Daniel scratched his chin. “If it helps you…”
“It does,” Jessica said firmly.
“We could get some medicine for little Will,” Iris murmured. She kissed the babe’s head, which was covered in light brown down, but the child barely moved in response.
“And shoes for Jeannie,” Daniel added.
After a moment, Iris cautiously approached Ezra, then plucked the coins from his outstretched hand. She ran her thumb back and forth across the golden surfaces as if confirming that they were real. Slowly, her lips curved upwards.
“I…we…thank you.” Despite her smile, she seemed abashed, slightly dazed.
“It isn’t that we aren’t appreciative,” her husband added, “but I wish we’d no need of the three of you.”
“A reasonable thing to wish for,” Ezra agreed. “Self-sufficiency is something everyone desires.”
“Not everyone,” Tej said grimly.
Ezra nodded. “Not those who live in the manor houses.”
“People like that take from people like us,” Rhys said, “and we’re here to keep things a little fairer.”
Daniel came forward to shake everyone’s hands, including Jessica’s. His hand was very rough and calloused, his grip strong.
“You have our gratitude,” the farmer said.
“Will you not stay for something to eat?” Iris pressed.
Ezra offered his most charming smile, and when the farmwife blushed, Jessica couldn’t fault her. Jessica’s own chest fluttered at the sight of Ezra’s flashing white teeth and the emergence of his dimple.
“Alas, time is not our friend today,” he said. “But we’ll return.”
“I’ll be sure to prepare my lemon cake,” Iris promised. “Jeannie will help. She’s a dab hand in the kitchen.”
“I’m going to be a cook at an inn someday,” the girl shyly confessed. She glanced at Jessica. “Come back and I’ll make you lemon cake.”
“Best in Essex,” Daniel said proudly.
“I do love lemon cake,” Jessica answered, which wasn’t a promise to return, and everyone but the girl knew it.
Jeannie beamed at her, and something fragmented beneath the cage of Jessica’s ribs.
Ezra turned to go, with Tej and Rhys doing the same.
They walked to the perimeter of the farm, untying their horse and stopping long enough to wave their goodbyes at the family.
Jessica lifted her hand in farewell, but she couldn’t gesture with much exuberance, not when she had no idea if or when she’d ever see Daniel, Iris, Jeannie, and the children again.
She joined the highwaymen as they dipped back into the forest.
“London’s full of people like them,” she murmured, as bracken crunched beneath her shoes.
“Rookeries bursting with the desperately poor. Hell, my own family had a shop but there wasn’t ever enough to go around.
We were better off than most in Stepney, though.
I considered myself blessed by providence to find some means of supporting myself. Few were—are—that fortunate.”
“It’s a story all over England,” Ezra said.
“So many have so little,” Tej noted.
“While a sliver possesses everything,” Rhys added.
Jessica stopped walking and faced the men. “Which is why you terrorize the road.”
Ezra spread his hands. “It’s never enough, there are always more struggling to survive.”
“Yet it’s something,” Jessica said, “which is more than most can claim. I give ha’pennies to crossing sweeps and posy sellers, but that’s paltry.”
“Not so paltry.” Tej moved to her and took her hand. “That’s a day’s meal you provided the crossing sweep and posy seller.”
“But in comparison—” Jessica shook her head. “It’s hardly the same.”
“Don’t fashion us into self-sacrificing heroes,” Ezra warned. “We do keep a portion for ourselves.”
She arched a brow. “I’ve seen how you live, and it’s not in the custom of anyone who makes a profit.”
He shrugged dismissively.
Rhys moved to her and laced his fingers with her free hand. “Thank you for convincing Daniel and Iris to take their share of the loot. Sometimes, they refuse it outright.”
“Their pride is understandable,” Jessica said.
“And your heart is remarkable.” Tej bent down and kissed her cheek, his silken beard brushing against her skin and making her shiver.
At the same time, Rhys kissed her other cheek.
Jessica’s eyes drifted shut. Never had two men kissed her at the same time. Warmth was all around her, and strength, and softness. She could fall in any direction with the knowledge that someone would catch her.
Heat from their bodies filled her. Rhys wasn’t exceptionally tall, but he was taut with muscle, and Tej was broad and strapping.
Beneath them both was a barely contained wildness that made her head spin and her heart beat faster.
This was only a taste of what it could be like to have all of their ferocity focused on her, and God, if she didn’t crave more of it.
Another warm body pressed close behind her. Fingers gently tipped her head back, and lips trailed down the side of her neck.
They surrounded her now, Tej, Rhys. Ezra.
Hands stroked over her. Gentle, probing touches glided along her arms, pressing against her midriff, and beneath the lapels of the coat she wore, to skate across her collarbone.
There were lips on her neck, stroking over her mouth, tracing the curve of her ear.
Three of them, three men with wolves lurking beneath their exteriors, all focused on her.
A bird cried out, piercing the quiet.
“That’s a nightjar,” Tej said lowly. “Dusk is coming.”
“Will all the stops we make be like the last?” she asked.
“They will,” Rhys said.
“They’re counting on you,” she murmured. “Much as I wish we could linger here, their needs supersede my own selfish desires.”
“We should go.” Reluctance was plain in Ezra’s voice.
“We should,” she agreed, but damn her for wishing the hours moved differently here, as if her own needs could change the fabric of time.