Free Defiant by Jessica Trapp Page A

carried together.
    Jared was heavy, and her shoulders sagged under his weight. He smelled faintly of leather and the outdoors, an altogether masculine scent, one she was totally unused to. It was almost heady.
    She shook off the silly thought. She did not wish to be attracted to him. Their relationship would be a business transaction—like buying a loaf of bread. Or a meat pie. She would marry him, give him a bit of gold, and send him on his way.
    He lurched, his legs shaky with drug. “Huh? Oh. I dishn’t mean to shrinks show—”
    “Just come on, dearie. We’ll show you to a nice bed to sleep it off, we will,” Irma said, tugging him farther upright.
    They dragged him, stumbling, through the kitchen. He kept moving one foot in front of the other in an artless stupor, half in, half out of slumber. He muttered unintelligible words. At last they got him, swaying this way and that as he went, to the back door.
    Freedom was just one husband away.

Chapter 8
    A pox on women!
    Jared St. John, bound and gagged, knelt on the hard stone floor of a small church not far from the brothel and vowed that when he got free, the whore holding a dagger to his back would get her comeuppance.
    He’d see her begging for a mercy that would not be forthcoming.
    He’d have her thrown into prison.
    He’d have her tried as a witch and burned at the stake.
    “Move forward,” she demanded. “Toward the altar. It’s only a little farther.”
    His pride, a fierce barbarian that hammered war drums in his chest, yowled in outrage as the point of her dagger pricked him betwixt his shoulder blades and prompted him to shuffle in the direction she wished. The small pinprick of pain, intensified by the spinning of his head, nearly sent him toppling to the floor.
    She’d tricked him.
    She’d drugged him.
    She’d kidnapped him.
    Not alone, but with the help of that fuzzy-headed Irma to whom he’d been kind for weeks—overpaying her for naught more than bathing and gossiping.
    “You are too large to carry,” Irma explained in that raspy voice Jared had come to associate with her quick and gentle hands whilst she washed him each week at the brothel. “Move forward, ah say, so we can close the doors. The ceremony will be over soon, and you can be on yer way.”
    There will be no ceremony,
he wanted to shout. Saliva oozed around the gag and leaked off his chin.
    His vision swam, and the woman—the one holding the dagger to his back—kept going in and out of focus. She seemed more well kept than the other harlots—downright attractive, to tell the truth.
    He tried to make out her features, but his vision bounced and blurred, disallowing him to discern her features.
    His hatred burned hotter, coming up in his throat. He would have spit on her if his mouth had not been stuffed with wool.
    The spinning in his head made it difficult to remain upright, and he had to concentrate to keep from falling over.
    The doors slammed behind him, an ominous sound in the midst of the church. His bound arms burned and he strained against the ropes until they cut into his wrists.
    Forcing a breath in through his nostrils, he blinked to keep himself upright. What had they drugged him with? His tongue felt thick and heavy as he pushed it against the woolen gag stuffed inside his mouth.
    “Who are you?” he mumbled, but his question sounded like garbled muck, unintelligible.
    The comely one looked nervously at her companion. “Irma, this is—”
    Irma shrugged. “Right. So ‘e’s not so docile as I expected. We’ll jes finish the marriage and get you both free. ‘e’ll be all right then after we explains t’all. ‘e’s ‘armless, ah tell you.”
    “I’m not sure—”
    “Oh, jes ‘urry up and marry ‘im. See ‘ere, Brother Giffard is ready. ‘es even got a Bible, ‘e does.”
    Raising his head, Jared stared at the tall, loose-limbed man clothed in a monk’s brown robe. He stood barefoot by the altar, a few yards in front of Jared. He had