Free Averill: Historical Romance (The Brocade Collection, Book 3) by Jackie Ivie Page B

her, and combed through her hair . She’d eaten some of the fruits and cheeses and flat breads they’d left just outside the door for her. She hadn’t needed artificial light. The moon was shedding plenty. And she knew the room layout. She’d had time to study it while Captain Tennison bathed earlier.
    There was a small antechamber with rolled-end cushions on the floor and low-lying marble tables . It led to a massive chamber that held the bed. Two rooms opened off opposite sides of the bedchamber. One of them held a deep tub, crafted from marble. It was large enough to hold Averill, but Captain Tennison had to bend his legs to fit. She wished she didn’t know that much. Such peeking wasn’t going to make it any easier to leave when the time came. She also wished it wasn’t so compelling.
    The bedroom chamber was more than forty paces in any direction . Carved columns were spaced every five paces about the center of the room. The architect had cut away a section of the roof, allowing moonlight to stream in, highlighting the bed. It was stirring, breath-taking, romantic…and yet frightening, too.
    Averill looked from contemplation of the palace walls beneath her back to the bedchamber. She wondered if she should make another circuit of the room, concentrating on the dark space between each column and the wall. She’d already done it four times, and found nothing. Perhaps she’d been mistaken. Perhaps the minister had placed them here for no other reason than she was Captain Tennison’s lover. It wasn’t far-fetched. The room looked created for romance, especially the bed, lit as it was with moonlight.
    Averill folded her arms on the balcony ledge and put her head on it and closed her eyes. It was very romantic, and she was very tired, and that made everything very dangerous. She tightened her lips in thought, lifted her head, and opened her eyes. And gasped. Burnoose-covered bodies leapt from one balcony beneath her to another one, their passage silent. Stealthy. Sinister.
    She’d known it !
    An d Captain Tennison hadn’t listened. Or...they were truly interested in her…and actually trying to steal her?
    Averill crawled backwards until a column stopped her. She was on her feet and to the next, and the next, and stopped there, trying to meld into the dark side of it. She was in shadow. In her dark-colored robe, and with her black hair, she’d be difficult to spot. Then again, they might be used to such a ploy. And she was out of time.
    “She’s not here . Curse that Al-Marabandi! He always lies. It was supposed to be easy.”
    “It is easy, my friend . What isn’t witnessed, doesn’t need to be silenced.”
    “You really think he hid her?”
    “Only if the ruse worked. What do we care? Come. We’ve work to do.”
    It took every bit of her courage, but Averill moved her head enough to peek. There were three figures in view. They were putting something under the edges of the bed. She could guess what it might be. Wait. She saw a fourth man. There could be more. She didn’t dare move to verify it. They’d been whispering in a Turkish dialect, almost too thick to understand.
    “There . It’s done.”
    “What about the woman?”
    “What of her? Perhaps Al-Marabandi has her and she’s already joined the harem. Who cares? It isn’t her body that we get paid for.”
    “We’re getting gold?”
    “We get the horses. It’s payment enough. Come.”
    As silently as they came, they slid over the window ledge . Averill watched their shadows move on the opposite wall. Fear pervaded everything. Stopping her mind. Chilling her limbs. She couldn’t move. The hands clinging to the column were moist and her knees hit against it as they shook. She still couldn’t believe what she’d just witnessed.  
    She couldn’t stay there! She moved to the next column and then the next, until she reached the one closest to the door. She wasn’t supposed to leave the room, but what if the men had left something so