Scoundrel's Kiss Read Free Page A

her eyes shut and licked her
lips, head falling back. Unbound hair the same red-brown of ripened dates
stretched to the shapely curve of her waist. Gavriel imagined digging his hands
into those silky strands, bending her body to his, tasting her white flesh.
Mouth dry, he choked on the image of transforming her look of peace into one of
desire. Desire for him.
    A quick glance revealed that animal
hunger mirrored across dozens of faces. Fernan bathed her with a look of abject
lust "Can I change my mind?" he asked.
    The muscles in Gavriel's arms and torso
tensed. The nameless woman inspired more thoughts of sin than he had suffered
in a month. Lust Envy. Wrath. He closed his eyes, breathless, but dark
imaginings would not leave him be. Squeezing his fists until he thought his
fingers would break, he prayed for strength—strength enough to hold his
temper until she was gone, until temptation passed.
    A loud commotion of shouts and drawn
swords clamored from the entrance. Heads turned. The same six guards materialized
out of the shadows, barring entrance to a young man with black, curling hair.
Patrons around the auction platform backed away from the disorder, cramming
bodies against bodies. One man elbowed Gavriel in the stomach. A woman
screamed.
    And so did the man at the door.
    "Ada!"
     
    Chapter 2
    The intruder, nothing more than a
half-grown boy, dodged swinging swords—jumping first, then rolling clear.
He scrambled between two guards and slipped like a fish from their grasp.
Spinning once, he drew a pair of exotic, curved blades from their sheaths.
Metal met metal as he defended against another guard, a man twice as wide and
twice as slow. The boy caught his opponent's sword between the curved blades
and twisted, sending the much heavier weapon to the ground.
    Gavriel watched the display with
curiosity, admiration, and envy. Saints save him, mostly envy. He had not seen
fighting skills of such refinement and natural grace in years, not since he
last held a weapon. Young and agile and calculating, the intruder fairly danced
through his attackers, disarming them when possible, incapacitating them as a
last resort.
    Well, that was one difference. Gavriel
had never hesitated to kill.
    The brothel's patrons bunched and
shrank like sheep in a pen. Women screamed and covered their exposed bodies;
only now, with the threat of violence, did they find their modesty. The
musicians tucked close to the rear alcove continued to play, oblivious to the
threat, or perhaps accustomed to a steady diet of violence and nightly disruptions.
    "This way," Pacheco said,
grabbing Fernan's slave by the arm. "Toward the alcove. There's a back
door."
    Hood in place, mouth agape but
blessedly silent, Fernan followed their master's urging. Tugging his slave's
arm, he turned toward the task of navigating a safe escape. But Gavriel did not
move.
    Another handful of guards emerged from
secret places. Roused from sleep or maybe from a harlot's bed, one had
forgotten his tunic but not his sword. Another strapping man picked up a piece
of wood from a broken table and used it as an impromptu shield. The boy was
outnumbered, and for what? Why? The slave girl?
    Gavriel found the woman rooted to the
same spot on the platform. The boy's desperate shout, the rolling waves of
violence and fear—none of it had changed her placid expression. She idly
reached a hand to the low beam ceiling, the stretch pulling her fitted bodice
taut over her breasts. A private smile turned the corners of her lips as she
teased loose a bit of crumbling plaster.
    "Gavriel, we must leave. This is
my command." Pacheco's thundercloud expression left no room for argument,
but Gavriel offered one anyway.
    "That boy stands eight to
one."
    "Do not think of going to his
aid." Pacheco squinted, reddening with anger. "Now do as you're told,
novice."
    Gavriel retrieved a fallen sword and
stood ready to aid the boy, to defy his master. He tightened his fingers around
the hilt and sank into a